The workshop was composed of six short presentations describing various aspects of wheat transformation. The talks were focused on particle bombardment and Agrobacterium-mediated transformation. Both DNA delivery strategies were reported to give about the same transformation frequency. Isolated scutella, immature embryos and inflorescens were the most commonly used explant materials, but the optimal explant tissue varied between different wheat cultivars. Selection strategies using bar or nptII as selectable marker genes were presented, and the use of GFP as a visual non-selectable marker was discussed. Transgene inheritance, gene efficacy and regulatory issues concerning commercialization of transgenic plants were also discussed.

The following talks were presented:

Optimizing Regeneration in an Agrobacterium-mediated Genetic Transformation System.
Brian Weir, Plant Biotechnology Institute, National Research Council of Canada, Saskatoon.

Genetic Transformation of Wheat - Approaches Towards Molecular Wheat Breeding.
Stephanie Luetticke, Center for Applied Plant Molecular Biology, Institute of General Botany, Hamburg.

Development of Transformation Systems for European Wheat Varieties.
Caroline Sparks, IACR, Rothamsted.

Agrobacterium vs. Bombardment.
Fiona Murray, CSIRO Division of Plant Industry, Canberra.

Development of scab symptoms is delayed in transgenic wheat plants that constitutively express a rice thaumatin-like protein.
Wenpin Chen, Kansas State University, Manhattan.

Developing Transgenic Wheats.
Huaping Zhou, Monsanto Co., St Louis.