**5.6 Transgenic approaches for developing Fusarium wilt resistant banana**

There are Fusarium wilt-resistant banana cultivars, and some have been conventionally developed through various breeding programmes. Now using techniques like particle bombardment or sonication assisted vacuum infiltration of the apical meristem, or using multiple bud clumps followed by Agrobacterium mediated gene transformation, genetic transformation of elite banana cultivars for resistance to Fusarium appears to be a more promising approach to improve disease resistance or tolerance. Testing the efficacy of the altered proteins against the target pathogen, which includes exposing the plants to the pathogen in an appropriate infective unit such as spores, is one of the most important phases in banana genetic engineering for disease resistance. Based on the antifungal activities of thaumatin like proteins are reported as a good candidate for genetic engineering toward production of disease resistant banana plants [21].
