Media optimization and the effect of benzyl amino purine (BAP) and gibberellic acid (GA3) on the shooting of Pterocarpus erinaceus Poir.

Abstract

Ptreocarpus erinaceus is a very useful forest tree due to its economic and medicinal values. It is also used as fodder for livestock due to its high nitrogen content. Its numerous use attract the high demand leading to it’s over exploitation. However, the tree is slow growing in nature. Hence, there is a need to look for in vitro methods for its mass propagation as an alternative method to raise healthy trees and sustain its availability. Media optimization gave two best performing media; Driver and kuniyuki Walnut (DKW) and Murashige and Skoog MS) which were further supplemented with different combinations of plant growth regulators (PGR)-Benzyl Amino Purine (BAP) and Gibberellic Acid (GA3). Overall, the DKW media with BAP/GA3 at 1.0/0.5 produced the highest shoot length while BAP/GA3 at 4.0/0.0 gave the highest number of leaves after eight weeks of inoculation. Effective utilization of these experimental conditions could be the impetus towards mass propagation of this important tree species.

Keywords: Ptreocarpus erinaceus, media optimization, Plant growth regulator, shoot length, mass propagation