Floral Reversion based micropropagation of Day-Neutral (Autoflower) Cannabis sativa L

Growing & Learning
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I came across this very interesting 2024 study and thought I should share it here for anyone who wants to preserve genetics, clone, and make seeds with their autos. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/384218471_Floral_Reversion_based_micropropagation_of_Day-Neutral_Cannabis_sativa_L

Summarized abstract: “Day-neutral (autoflower) cannabis is hard to clone the usual way, so researchers used floral reversion—turning tiny flower parts back into leafy shoots. They tested 12–24 hour light cycles for four weeks; 16 hours gave the highest reversion (72%), 20 hours produced the longest shoots. Reverted shoots rooted, were grown to maturity (made seeds), and the method worked on a 2-year lab culture. Conclusion: floral reversion is a reliable way to clonally propagate day-neutral cannabis.”

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Summarized conclusion: "This study is the first to show a lab cloning method (micropropagation) that works for day‑neutral (autoflower) cannabis. Before this, breeders had to work with large mixed populations because they couldn’t make exact clones to test traits or do precise F1 crosses like they do with photoperiod plants.

What this protocol does: Lets breeders make clonal parent plants for targeted F1 crosses and faster selection/inbreeding. Speeds up genetic improvement.

Key results: Shoots produced by floral reversion (turning flower tissue back into vegetative shoots) from even a two‑year‑old culture were moved to a greenhouse and grew into plants.

Those plants tended to flower quickly and stayed small, but they completed their life cycle and produced seeds.

Bottom line: floral reversion provides a reliable way to clone and breed day‑neutral (autoflower) cannabis, enabling better research and commercial breeding."

I’ll definitely be trying this out with my next auto run and pollinate one for seeds, and a few extras to experiment with and see how far they can be pushed. Has anyone here tried this out? What do you think about this process?

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Very interesting information with science to back. Sad thing is there wont be seeds in future…their working on stuff now to eliminate seeds :cry: the industry is taking nature and our hobby…interesting stuff with underlying problems unfortunately

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Sorry I don’ t quite understand what you mean by this. Are you talking about just the States?

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I cloned the very first auto I grew. Didn’t know it was an auto. Rooted just fine, but never stopped flowering. I had these 5 little single bud plants. Was so weird.

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Now, if only they could make this method easier for everyone to use for preservation. We don’t really grow autos but interesting to know how complicated those little girls are. Ruderalis, I was going to get some seeds but.