pollen germination

[als152 at PSU.EDU]

At 1:48 AM 12/19/96, liliane sticher wrote:
>Dear Arabinetters,
>
>Does any of you know of methods to collect, store, and germinate Arabidopsis
>pollen.
>Thanks for your help.
>
>Liliane Sticher


Hi Liliane,

I am not sure of the best way to collect Arabidopsis pollen. I have
collected a lot of Petunia pollen for germination. I found the best way is
to harvest the entire anther (providing it is shedding pollen). Once the
anthers have been collected, simply add your pollen germination media to
the anthers and LIGHTLY vortex to separate pollen from the anthers. Spin
briefly at a low speed to pellet the anthers and then pipette out the
supernant which contains your pollen.

I have not had much luck storing pollen. After a day or too at 4 degrees it
seems to loose its viability. I usually collect pollen immeadiately before
I am ready to germinate it.

For germination media, I use the media described by the Clarke lab - it
works well for Petunia and tobacco pollen. I am not sure if there is a
better reference for Arabidopsis pollen. If you need the Clarke reference,
let me know and I can get it for you.

Hope this helps

Joe Verica
Penn State
jdc6 at psu.edu