The generation of new hybrid varieties of tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.) is the most widely used breeding method for this species and requires at least seven self-fertilization cycles to generate stable parent lines. The development of doubled haploids aims at obtaining completely homozygous lines in a single generation, although, to date, routine commercial application has not been possible in this species. In contrast, obtaining doubled haploid lines via gynogenesis has been successfully implemented in recalcitrant crops such as melon, cucumber, pumpkin, loquat and walnut. This review provides an overview of the requirements and advantages of gynogenesis as an inducer of haploidy in different agricultural crops, with the purpose of assessing the potential for its application in tomato breeding. Successful cases of gynogenesis variants involving in vitro culture of unfertilized ovules, use of 60Co-irradiated pollen, in vivo haploid inducers and wide hybridization are presented, suggesting that these methodologies could be implemented in tomato breeding programs to obtain doubled haploids.
Keywords: breeding; doubled haploids; in vitro ovule culture; in vivo haploid inducers; irradiated pollen; wide hybridization.