High throughput selection of antibiotic-resistant transgenic Arabidopsis plants

Kanamycin resistance is the most frequently used antibiotic-resistance marker for Arabidopsis transformations, however, this method frequently causes escape of untransformed plants, particularly at the high seedling density during the selection. Here we developed a robust high-density selection method using top agar for Arabidopsis thaliana. Top agar effectively suppressed growth of untransformed wild-type plants on selection media at high density. Survival of the transformed plants during the selection were confirmed by production of green true leaves and expression of a firefly luciferase reporter gene. Top agar method allowed selection using a large amount of seeds in Arabidopsis transformation.