Abstract

Cross breeding is a crucial approach for improving the quality of oil palm. As pollination and fertilization are the fundamental processes underlying high yield. Therefore, proper pollen germination is of great importance to this process. The Pisifera line serves as the male parent in the production of Tenera hybrid oil palm. Prior to pollination, the viability and germination potential of the male parent pollen must be examined. Thus, the objective of this experiment was to determine the appropriate culture medium for the in vitro germination of Pisifera oil palm pollen. The results revealed that Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium combined with sucrose (0.05% MS + 0.01 g/mL sucrose) played a catalytic role in promoting pollen germination. However, doubling the concentration of the culture medium did not enhance pollen germination. While sucrose alone was able to stimulate pollen germination, its effect was inferior compared to the combination of MS and sucrose. Therefore, this experiment concludes that an optimal combination of MS and sucrose can enhance the efficiency of in vitro oil palm pollen germination. These findings are expected to be valuable for preparing viable pollen for practical applications in oil palm pollination.