In vitro propagation of garlic (Allium sativum L.) through adventitious shoot organogenesis

Abstract

The present study investigates in vitro regeneration of three garlic cultivars; that is, Balady, Sids 40 and VFG 180 (3 - 1) as well as a garlic wild type through adventitious shoot organogenesis. Shoot and root apices were subjected to eight callus induction treatments. A combination of 1 mg L^-1 2,4-D + 5 mg L^-1 BA + 5 mg L^-1 NAA produced a 100% of callus induction from root apices for all garlic cultivars tested. Shoot apices showed higher frequency of callus induction than root apices. Balady cultivar showed the highest frequency of callus induction while Sids 40 showed the lowest values. Shoot apices had higher callus fresh weight than root apices in Balady and Sids 40 cultivars as well as wild type. The cultivar Balady had the highest callus fresh weight whereas the wild type had the lowest values. There were large variations in the regeneration efficiency among the eight callus clones as well as different garlic cultivars. The wild type failed to regenerate shoots. The highest shoot number per root induced callus (48.8) was obtained from C7 callus line cultured into B5 medium supplemented with 10 mg L^-1 Kin and 2 mg L^-1 IAA. The cultivar Sids 40 showed the lowest regeneration efficiency among other cultivars with 1.5 shoots per explant. For callus induced from shoot apices, the eight callus lines for both Sids 40 cultivar and the wild type failed to regenerate shoots and the cultivar VFG 180 (3 -1) showed very low regeneration efficiency. The Balady cultivar showed the highest regeneration efficiency with 39 shoots per explant. The regenerated garlic shoots were in vitro rooted and acclimatized in greenhouse prior to their cultivation in open field. Garlic plantlets derived through tissue culture required three vegetative generations to produce bulbs of commercial size.

Keywords: Acclimatization, garlic, organogenesis, tissue culture

African Journal of Biotechnology, Vol 13(38) 3892-3900