Large DNA Transformation in Plants

Large DNA (>100 kb) transformation methods have been reported in tomato using Agrobacterium -mediated transformation (1 ) and tobacco using biolistic bombardment (2 ). Both methods used modified bacterial artificial chromosomes (BACs) such as BIBAC or pBACwich. BIBAC vector (used in tomato) is capable of transferring large DNA fragments from Agrobacterium into plants. pBACwich (used in tobacco) utilizes a Cre/lox site-specific recombination system to integrate large DNA fragments into plant chromosomes.