From a student of Francko:

Title
Tissue Culture, Genetic Transformation and Cold Tolerance Mechanisms in Cold-Hardy Palms
Author
Lokuge, Meepa A
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy, Miami University, Botany, 2006.
Advisor
Kenneth G Wilson
Pages
148p.
Abstract
Palms are a familiar and characteristic feature of tropical landscapes. Some palm species survive temperatures below -6.70C (200 F) and few survive temperatures below -17.70C (00 F). Needle palm, cabbage palm and Chinese windmill palm are very resistant to cold under USDA Plant Hardiness Zone 6 conditions. The first part of this study was undertaken to develop a tissue culture system for the clonal propagation of cold-hardy palms with desired characters and with the ultimate goal of producing a system for genetic transformation. Windmill palm was regenerated from shoot apical meristem tissues via indirect organogenesis, giving rise to viable plants that fully acclimated to greenhouse conditions. With cabbage palm 1.5 µM dicamba was optimal for the induction of somatic embryogenesis from zygotic embryos. The second part of this study was aimed at developing a genetic transformation system for cold-hardy palms. Cabbage palm was selected because it’s widespread use throughout USDA Zone 8 and previous data suggest that with minor improvement in cold tolerance this palm could be grown in even colder areas. Cabbage palm zygotic embryos were successfully transformed with the marker genes gfp and gus using the two most common plant transformation methods, biolistic and Agrobacterium-mediated transformation. Results indicated that Agrobacterium -mediated transformation gave more promising results when compared with the biolistic method. Plants exhibit two strategies for surviving extremely cold weather: freeze avoidance and freeze tolerance. Both strategies involved supercooling mechanisms and other adaptations that have not been characterized in palms. The final part of this dissertation was aimed at studying these mechanisms using the most cold-hardy palm, the needle palm, as a model system. According to our results needle palm supercooling capacity is already pronounced even in warm-incubated foliage and does not change significantly after exposure to cold-acclimating conditions. To further investigate the molecular mechanisms underlying this cold tolerance, a proteomic approach was used to examine initial changes of the leaf proteome upon cold treatment. Protein identification was difficult due to non- availability of relevant genome sequences. Nevertheless, 2- dimensional gel electrophoresis suggested that significant changes in protein products occur in needle palm leaves when challenged with non-lethal cold.

so id have to make a small "grow op" in the basement

Canadianplant, I'm setting up a growing area that will take up about half of my computer room! I'll try to post pics as it progresses, but right now it's still in planning 😆

Paul,
do you know of anyone doing scientific experiments on palm physiology as related to cold tolerance? All the serious research I find on palms is, predictably, on the commercially important ones--date palm, coconut, oil palm. Everything else I find is from us hobbyists. I find some neat molecular systematics work on occasion, but not physiology. This is not my academic speciality so I might be missing some obvious work you know of. --Erik

Erik- You may try posting that on the Subtropical board. You may get a reply from Allen Hirsh and/or John B who have, or may know who has, done some controlled tests with T. fortunei (or Sabal, etc.)...

I can't find any published papers on the subject.

It is an interesting topic. Personaly id think the closer related the plant you tried, the better the odds of success.

If all plants come from a common ancistor, it would be safe to assume that plants ( mabey not palms), may have some genetic cold hardy "switch" in their genes that you could flick on?

may have some genetic cold hardy "switch" in their genes that you could flick on?

There is a guy here that has subjected Aloe Vera to colder and colder temps for 40 years.

If you know anything about Aloe Vera,you know they are not very cold hardy and
begin to suffer around 40f or less.

One thing about developing cold hardiness in palms is that you need to wait for the next generation of seeds,
you have to get the seeds,grow them and weed out the weaker ones every generation-this takes time.

40 years is a long time in some respects but not applied in this way...consider that Aloe Vera puts out
loads of shoots every year,you can build the parents and pups cold hardiness at the same time!

The guy I got them from says they have survived down to 12(f),-11c!

I don't know how many times mine could tolerate those temps but they have seen about 26-28(f)
about -2 to -3c with no damage.

I will find out this year how cold hardy this Aloe is,you can see part of it in the first pic of
the last picture post I did.

This is exactly what i was talking about. Except i was talking about bamboo. I just want sure if a plant that sets seeds slower, or faster would encourage better cold hardiness.

I think it may be on both accounts, biological/physiology, and accimitization. To me it makes sence if these go hand in hand ( then again im nto a scientist).

AS for the aloe:S thats pretty good. Arent there species that are hardy to zone 7 or 6? The one fromt he medditeranian would have to be able to be exposed to some frost in its natural enviroment correct?

Most of the Aloe's are from Africa... From bloody tropical Africa. They would grow in the Italy or the French Mediterranean coast but they won't survive when the cold spells more than 2 or 3 days. They are too fleshy...

This is exactly what i was talking about. Except i was talking about bamboo. I just want sure if a plant that sets seeds slower, or faster would encourage better cold hardiness.

I think it may be on both accounts, biological/physiology, and accimitization. To me it makes sence if these go hand in hand ( then again im nto a scientist).

AS for the aloe:S thats pretty good. Arent there species that are hardy to zone 7 or 6? The one fromt he medditeranian would have to be able to be exposed to some frost in its natural enviroment correct?

There are some Aloes that are more hardy-much more than Aloe vera

Like Igor said,Africa/"tropical"-some sources say hardy to 45(f) only.
There are some down the street that
someone may be leaving out(I hope they do, 😈 they have also seen mid to upper 20s(f),they are brown now.
Mine still have the lovely color-you can kind of see it-here.

Upper left corner.

Check out Aloe ecklonis, Aloe cooperi, Aloe polyphylla, Aloe striatula, etc. The grass aloe types from southern Africa are generally the hardiest.

So what kind of aloe is that jim? From that pic it looks like plain ole aloe vera.

Erik,

About 25 years ago, I made my thesis on the cold/winter hardiness. At that time, there was a research centre in North Japan, on Hokkaido that performed extensive studies in cold hardiness and in the related plant physiology. What they did was that they gradually decreased the temperature in the plants' enviromnets and observed the tissue reaction. They had hundreds of plants involved and the results were amazing! This is the research centre that provided most data on the supercooling of Rhododendrons, suggested trying out exotics like Firminiana for zone 7, gave a lot of insights into the evregreens' reactions to cold (e.g. 2 exotherm reactions down the drain, extracellular ice formation, etc...) If I remember well, the professor's name was Dr Sakai.

Good luck with your research!
Rob

Thanks, Rob.
I'm pretty busy right now, but hope to devote time to library work on cold-tolerance palms in January. If anyone else is interested, we can have a thread for our reading. I have made a little time and am finding some interesting snippets of stuff on gene expression. It seems to support Jim's hypothesis that some early exposure to cold prepares a palm for worse later, but I need to make time to read more. That will be in a while. I just put in another 15 hours day at work, have another tomorrow, and yet need to get some garden work in before a possible/likely first hard freeze Saturday morning. I have been busy/foolish and so have stuff like Hibiscus rosa-sinensis still in the ground....
--Erik
P.S. about Firmiana--does anyone here grow that? I have a friend who does around here and it does great for him. Never available for sale, but he will give me "volunteers." Hey, just trying to get back to CP's original point on this thread...

Dont worry eric, I think all this needed to be said. Im really pushing the limits here and this information has actualy helped me out quite a bit, and hopefuly everyone else.

Ive never seent that tree before.... Your referencing the parasol tree? People say its gros int he following areas:
Elizabeth City, North Carolina
Dayton, Ohio
Norman, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Stillwater, Oklahoma
Florence, South Carolina
Arlington, Tennessee
Pocahontas, Tennessee
Austin, Texas

And yes, we shoudl create a thread about physiological and acclimitive adaptaions in palms/plants........

Erik- I planted one out a few years ago. It was small and made it to, perhaps, December. I have another that I'm growing indoors... I don't mean to be negative here, but, from what I've seen it's a nice tree, however, it'd nothing to write home about.

I think you could grow it no problem down there! It'll give you an opportunity to show me that I'm wrong.