Morphological and biochemical comparison of Hippophae rhamnoides, Elaeagnus umbellata and Crataegus oxyacantha intra- and interspecifically

The hilly areas of Pakistan are very rich in medicinal plants. Among these, Hippophae rhamnoides ssp turkestanica L., Elaeagnus umbellata Thunb. and Crataegus oxyacantha L. are native plants of Northern Pakistan. Intra- and interspecific comparisons were made to investigate their morphological and biochemical composition using morpho-molecular techniques. The comparisons indicated large genetic and biochemical variation among the populations of each species and between the different species. The sodium dodecyl sulphate polycrylamide gel electro- phoresis comparisons using total seed proteins of Hippophae rhamnoides, Elaeagnus umbellata and Crataegus oxyacantha indicated many common proteins and some variable proteins among the species. The biochemical comparison of Vitamin C, fatty oil and phytosterol content was also found to be variable among the species. Vitamin C and fatty oil contents were highest in Hippophae rhamnoides while phytosterol content was highest in Crataegus oxyacantha when compared with the other species tested in this study. Significant variation in morphological characters including plant height, number of branches per plant, number of thorns, plant canopy and berry weight was also observed in these three plant species.