REVIEW ARTICLE 101 Plant Sciences Feed 2011 - 1 (7): 101-111 PLANT SCIENCES FEED ISSN : 2231 - 1971 Jounal Homepage : http://psf.lifescifeed.com BIOTECHNOLOGICAL APPROACHES FOR HIGH SUGARCANE YIELD RAKESH SINGH SENGAR,KALPANA SENGAR AND SANJAY KUMAR GARG* A UTHOR A FFILIATIONS A BSTRACT Tissue culture Lab, College of Biotechnology, Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel University of Agriculture & Technology, Meerut-250110 *Department of plant sciences, M.J.P. Rohil Khand University, Bareilly. U.P. (India) Email- rakesh.sengar77@gmail.com In sugarcane, biotechnological applications are yielding encouraging results in the areas of genome characterization, mapping for specific traits, molecular variability of pathogens, marker aided selection for insect/disease resistance, transformation, precise detection of plant pathogens etc. Increased sensitivity has generally made the assays for pathogens more reliable and contributes in making the assays more rapid and economical for routine detection and identification. Tissue culture is playing an important role in improving the plant quality and producing pathogen free plants. This can be used to produce clones of phytoplasma infected plants that are healthy. For virus elimination the micropropagation using the shoot apical meristem as the explants is the best way to produce virus free plants. Research efforts need to be made to minimize somaclonal variation for use in clonal propagation and transgenic research. New information on the molecular biology and genetics of selected tropical crop plants need to be generated. Genomics structure should be worked out to identify markers linked to important agronomics traits. Transgene constructs that mitigate potential environmental and biosafety risks of transgenic plants need to be developed so that it can be managed. Regulatory controls over metabolisms need to be identified and characterized to improve yield and quality of sugarcane. © 2011 LifeSciFeed Ventures KEYWORDS Sugarcane, micropropagation, meristem, somaclonal variation and transgenic. I NTRODUCTION Sugarcane occupies a distinct position as an agro- industrial crop of India, covering around 5.15 million hectares area (over 3% of the total cultivated area) with an annual cane production of 355.52 million tons (2006-2007), contributing about 9.5% to the gross value of the agricultural production in the country. About 50 million farmers and equal number of agricultural laborers depend on sugarcane for their livelihood. Half a million skilled workers are also engaged in the sugar industry. A total of 453 sugar factories crushed 194.4 million tons of cane (69% of total cane production) producing 20.14 million tons of sugar. Average yield of sugarcane in India is about 69 tons per hectare. India ranks second in world sugar production next to Brazil. The crop sustains the second largest agro-industry next to cotton and textile industry in the country. In addition sugarcane also supports a large number of open pan sugar (Khandsari) and Jaggery (Gur) units in unorganized sector. The commercially cultivated crops of sugarcane have two geographic centers of origin viz. New Guinea and Northern India. The large erected tropical species of sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum) was perhaps