Transgenic Arabidopsis tester lines with dominant marker genes.

The map positions of a set of eight T-DNA insertions in the Arabidopsis genome have been determined by using closely linked visible markers. The insertions are dispersed over four of the five chromosomes. Each T-DNA insert contains one or more of the chimeric marker genes neomycin phosphotransferase (neo), hygromycin phosphotransferase (hpt), phosphinothricin acetyltransferase (bar), beta-glucuronidase (gusA) and indole-3-acetamide hydrolase (iaaH). The neo, hpt and bar marker genes are dominant in a selective germination assay or when used as DNA markers in a polymerase chain reaction. These dominant markers will allow recombinants to be discerned in a germinating F2 population, one generation earlier than with a conventional recessive marker. The transgenic marker lines will speed up and simplify the isolation of recombinants in small genetic intervals, a rate-limiting step in positional cloning strategies. The transgenic lines containing the hpt marker will also be of interest for the isolation of deletion mutants at the T-DNA integration sites.