Evolution of whole cells and organisms by recursive sequence recombination

A method of evolving a cell to acquire a desired property, comprising:

• (i.) forming protoplasts of a population of different cells;
• (ii.) fusing the protoplasts to form hybrid protoplasts, in which genomes from the protoplasts recombine to form hybrid genomes;
• (iii.) incubating the hybrid protoplasts under conditions promoting regeneration of cells, thereby producing regenerated cells;
• (iv.) forming protoplasts from the regenerated cells, fusing the protoplasts to form hybrid protoplasts, in which genomes from the protoplasts recombine to form additional hybrid genomes;
• incubating the additional hybrid protoplasts under conditions promoting regeneration of cells, thereby producing additional regenerated cells;
• (v.) selecting or screening to isolate regenerated cells or additionally regenerated cells that have evolved toward acquisition of the desired property;
• and,
• (vi.) repeating steps (i.)-(v.) with regenerated cells in step (iii.) or additional regenerated cells in step (iv.) being used to form the protoplasts in step (i.) until the regenerated cells have acquired the desired property.