Plant Tissue Cult. 5(2) : 147-152, 1995

Establishment of Medium-term Tissue Cultures of Picrorhiza kurroa and Rheum emodi

Nand Lal¹ and Paramvir Ahuja²

Division of Plant Tissue Culture, CIMAP, Lucknow 226 015, India

Key words: Picrorhiza kurroa, Rheum emodi, Shoot cultures, Medium-term cultures, Low temperature storage, Mineral oil

Abastract

Shoot and callus cultures of two endangered medicinal plants, Picrorhiza kurroa Royle ex Benth. And Rheum emodi Wall., were maintained for 64 and 30 weeks, respectively on hormone-free MS medium incubated at 4-10⁰C in the dark. Shoot explants of both the species survived for shorter durations at 25⁰C on MS medium incubated either in the light or dark (with or without mineral oil overaly). Encapsulated shoot buds of P. kurroa could also be stored up to 24 weeks on nutrient-free agar from 4-10⁰C in the dark. Like-wise, subculturing of callus cultures could be prolonged up to 35 weeks by maintaining the cultures at 25⁰C on optimal growth medium overlaid with mineral oil. Morphogenic potential of R. emodi callus was slightly reduced as observe in recovery tests. P. kurroa shoots maintained at 4-10⁰C showed induction of multiple shoots on the media lacking cytokinin.

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