Agrobacterium-mediated genetic transformation of date palm ( Phoenix dactylifera L.) cultivar "Khalasah" via somatic

In present investigation, an efficient Agrobacteriummediated genetic transformation was successfully carried out for a well known date palm ( Phoenix dactylifera L.) cultivar “Khalasah” using matured somatic embryos. Somatic embryogenesis was initiated from offshoot’s shoot tips of date palm cultivar. For genetic transformation, morphologically advanced matured somatic embryos developed on MS medium fortified with TDZ (1.0 mg/l) were co-cultured with A. tumefaciens strain LBA 4404 harboring binary vector pBI 121, containing uidA (GUS ) and npt II genes and incubated for