used as a vector to transfer the engineered T-DNA into the plant cells where it integrates into the plant genome. This method can be used to generate transgenic plants carrying a foreign gene. Agrobacterium tumefaciens is capable of transferring foreign DNA to both monocotyledons and dicotyledonous plants efficiently while taking care of critically important factors like the genotype of plants, types and ages of tissues inoculated, kind of vectors, strains of Agrobacterium, selection marker genes and selective agents, and various conditions of tissue culture. The same procedure of T-DNA transfer can be used to disrupt genes via insertional mutagenesis. Not only does the inserted T-DNA sequence create a mutation but its insertion also 'tags' the affected gene, thus allowing for its isolation as T-DNA flanking sequences. A reporter gene can be linked to the right end of the T-DNA to be transformed along with a plasmid replicon and a selectable antibiotic (such as hygromycin)-resistance gene and can explicit approximately 30% of average efficiency having successful T-DNA inserts induced gene fusions in Arabidopsis thaliana. Reverse genetics involves testing the presumed function of a gene that is known by disrupting it and then looking for the effect of that induced mutation on the organismal phenotype. T-DNA tagging mutagenesis involves screening of populations by T-DNA insertional mutations. Collections of known T-DNA mutations provide resources to study the functions of individual genes, as developed for the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana. Examples of T-DNA insertion mutations in Arabidopsis thaliana include those associated many classes of phenotypes including seedling-lethals, size variants, pigment variants, embryo-defectives, reduced-fertility, and morphologically or physiologically aberrant plants. See also Transfer DNA binary system References Further reading Biotechnology Bacterial plant pathogens and diseases DNA mobile genetic elements