Rice is one of the most important cereal crops in the world and a model plant for functional genomics of monocotyledon. Recently, rice crop loss is estimated to be approximately 30% of the total yield due to herbivorous pests, mainly insects. Cry1Ac toxin is a protein produced by the bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis and has insecticidal properties. CryBP1 toxin also is an insecticidal protein produced by the bacterium Bacillus popilliae. These two toxic genes derived bacteria, which were inserted into a binary vector, have been introduced into rice plants by Agrobacterium tumefaciens mediated transformation in order to enhance resistance to insects. Here, we utilized anthers to regenerate transgenic rice plants when it has been plated on the callus induction media as a callus-inducing material. Anther culture has a benefit in terms of being apt to produce doubled haploids in short term in plants breeding compared to seed culture. However, anther culture method in generating transgenic rice still has low productivity of plant regeneration in some genotypes of Japonica rice. Therefore, we examined the efficiency of callus induction and transformation with three different cultivars of Japonica rice, Haiami, Ungwang and Dongjin. In this study, our results showed that Haiami is the best genotype among three cultivars of Japonica rice as callus inducing material in anther culture to produce transgenic rice plants conferring resistance to insects.

Drought and salinity are the major abiotic stresses which are being continued to hamper the ecosystem and agriculture of the affected region. Plant species have adaptations to enhance their ability to tolerate stresses through physiological adjustment. Therefore, substantial amount of research are ongoing to provide insights about those mechanisms which enlighten the stress tolerance in plant. In this study, several rice cultivars were collected from the different parts of the world and ion accumulation experiments were conducted to select the best stress tolerant cultivar in drought and salt stress environment. For stress treatment, five rice cultivars were subjected to salt (200 mM NaCl) and drought (200 mM Mannitol) for 72h. Later Na+, Ca++, K+ concentrations in shoot and root samples were examined at different time interval. In both drought and salt stress, rice cultivar C201 (collected for uzbekistan) showed the lowest levels of Na+ ion and Na+: K+ ratio compared to other cultivars. It was significant parallel observation with pokkali (known salt tolerant cultivar). In this preliminary study, it was observed the C201 had more stress tolerant in terms of ion accumulation; however detail physiological studies are required to strengthen the idea regarding the best stress tolerant physiotype.