Somatic embryogenesis was initiated from `immature embryos' on Murashige-Skoog (MS) medium plus 2 mg .1 -1 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid, 2% sucrose and 0 .6% agarose. Somatic embryos were isolated and regenerated into whole green plants on MS medium devoid of 2,4-D . These regenerants were previously demonstrated to differ in their mitochondrial DNA organization . In order to estimate their characteristics three progenies of short-term culture regenerants and three progenies of long-term culture regenerants were analyzed and compared to the parental line . These somaclones obtained from the wheat variety Chinese Spring were evaluated for variation of 13 agronomic and morphological quantitative characters in comparison to the parental line . Significant variation was observed for plant height, spike length, main tiller diameter, between the somaclones regenerated from long-term culture and their parent . Differences were observed to increase with the duration of culture, leading to a significant modification of the structure of the plants . Several changes occurred during the somatic tissue cultures, but to a lesser extent than has previously been described in the literature .