Search

Changes in temperatures, relative humidity and day length play an important role in the variation of essential oils contents and its compositions in medicinal and aromatic plants. In order to inves...

Background Eustoma grandiflorum is a new floral crop for the international flowers market, moderately cold-tolerant annual or biennial plant. A large number of seedlings can be produced by seed propagation but the quality is not uniform due to variations in the flowering time, plant height, and the number of flowers. Propagation of Eustoma grandiflorum plant by tissue culture technique is relatively low. Inducing mutations is one of the powerful tools for breeding biotechnology. Laser mutagenesis is an easy and new tool. The goal of the present work was to investigate the influence of laser irradiation on in vitro growth, anatomy, flowering, chemicals composition, and gene mutagenesis. Results The most of morphological, floral parameters, total chlorophyll, carotenoids, and anthocyanin pigment contents in the flower recorded increment by most treatments of laser types. The highest survival percentage of acclimatized plants (95%) and highest values of number of branches and branches length (cm) were obtained from treated plantlets by 20 min of green laser, while most of highest floral parameters, anthocyanin pigment contents in flower, and anatomical structural parameters recorded increasing using 20 min of blue laser and 20, 25 min of green and red laser, respectively. Contrary, the lowest values of photosynthetic pigments and carotenoids were obtained from 20 min of green laser. Conclusions The current research concluded that laser irradiation has remarkable effect on plant morphology, flowering, chemical constituents, and gene mutagenesis.

NUTRITION and some environmental variables play a major role in the growth and development of ornamental plants. Two pot experiments were carried out in a randomized complete block design to study the effect of foliar application of biostimulator agent (Atonik, 0.2%) and different sources of potassium viz. potassium sulphate (2g/L), potassium citrate (2g/L) and potassium humate (3g/L) on growth parameters and chemical constituents of Salvia farinacea plants grown under full sun and/or partial shade conditions (50 % shade) during 2014/15 and 2015/16 seasons. Foliar application of atonic and different sources of potassium enhanced growth, chlorophyll, total carbohydrates and mineral contents of plants grown in both environments. Under full sun, spraying plants with K humate gave the highest number of leaves and inflorescences as well as the highest biomass of fresh and dry leaves, while under partial shade, spraying plants with K citrate + atonik gave the highest values of these traits. Foliar application of K citrate + atonik gave the highest values of fresh and dry weight of inflorescences in both environments. Plants grown under partial shade conditions were superior in plant height and individual leaf area, while those grown under open field conditions were superior in stem diameter, number of leaves, branches, roots and inflorescences per plant, fresh and dry weight of leaves, stems, roots and inflorescences per plant as well as chlorophyll, total carbohydrates and mineral contents.