Question

The tissue culture technique used to produce seedless fruit is

• A. Meristem culture
• B. Anther culture
• C. Pollen culture
• D. Endosperm culture

Hint:

Angiosperm endosperm tissue is naturally triploid ($3n$).
Culturing this tissue is the most direct way to regenerate triploid plants, bypassing the need to cross tetraploid ($4n$) and diploid ($2n$) parents to produce triploid seed.

Answer 1

The Correct Option is D

Step 1: Understanding the Concept:
In angiosperms, triploid ($3n$) plants are typically sterile because their three sets of chromosomes cannot pair evenly during meiosis.
This prevents them from forming viable gametes and seeds.
Regenerating plants from triploid tissue in vitro produces sterile triploid plants that can be grown to produce seedless fruits.

Step 2: Detailed Explanation:
Let us evaluate each of the listed tissue culture techniques to determine their ploidy outcomes and applications:
Meristem culture uses the apical meristem to regenerate virus-free diploid ($2n$) plants, matching Option (A).
Anther and pollen cultures involve culturing haploid ($1n$) microspores to regenerate haploid plants, which can then be doubled to produce homozygous double-diploids ($2n$), matching Options (B) and (C).
Endosperm is a unique tissue in angiosperms formed by double fertilization, where one male gamete ($1n$) fuses with the diploid polar nuclei ($2n$), resulting in a triploid ($3n$) genetic constitution.
Culturing endosperm tissue and regenerating plants from it produces triploid plants.
Because triploid plants cannot undergo normal meiosis, they do not produce viable seeds.
When these plants are grown, they produce seedless fruits through parthenocarpy, which is highly useful for commercial crops like seedless triploid watermelon, grapes, and citrus.

Step 3: Final Answer:
Endosperm culture is the tissue culture technique used to produce seedless fruit.
This corresponds to Option (D).