Influence of cytokinins on in vitro morphogenesis in root cultures of Centaurium erythraea—Valuable medicinal plant

The purpose of this work was to acquire more information on the capacity of in vitro grown Centaurium erythraea Gillib. normal and hairy root cultures to simultaneously regenerate adventitious buds and to evaluate the variations induced on regeneration response by treatments with six cytokinins. Explants from normal and hairy root cultures were cultured on half-strength MS medium (1/2 MS) with kinetin (KIN), N6-benzylaminopurine (BA), 6-γ,γ-dimethylallylaminopurine (2IP), N-(2-chloro-4-pyridyl)-N′-phenylurea (CPPU), 1-Phenyl-3-(1,2,3-thiadiazol-5-yl)urea (TDZ) and 6-[4-Hydroxy-3-methyl-but-2-enylamino]purine (ZEA), used alone in six different concentrations. The average number of adventitious buds per explant was promoted by all of cytokinin treatments. Urea-type cytokinins, TDZ and CPPU were more effective for the induction the morphogenesis of adventitious buds than adenine-type cytokinins. We found that the 1.0 μM CPPU induced the largest number (25.6, 18.2, respectively) of adventitious buds in normal and hairy root culture. TDZ-supplemented media induced highest number of adventitious buds (24.2) from normal root explant, but from hairy root explant average number of buds is lower (20.5). Regenerated shoots were excised and placed on 1/2 MS medium without hormone. The rooted plantlets were successfully acclimatized in greenhouse conditions.