Evaluating the Role of Brassinosteroids in Shoot Multiplication in Sugarcane (Saccharum Officinarum. L) Underin-vitro Conditions

Abstract

Sugarcane(Saccharum spp) is commercially cultivated crop in both tropical and subtropical region contributing 75% of total sugar production of the world.Due to its commercial importance, it holds a strategic position in world agriculture and is now considered as the major renewable energy crop.It is planted through stem buds “setts” in the form of seed. Due to the stem cutting, there may always chances for systematic diseases and sometime it is often not possible to ensure genetic purity that limits the efficiency of this method. Using conventional methods, the newly developed variety takes more time to adoption by farmers due to non availability of seed that also affects the sugarcane production. Now days plant tissue culture methods like micropropagation has been established as an efficient and reliable tool for production of true-to- type and quality planting material. During in-vitro propagation, plant growth regulators play an important role for rapid or higher shoot establishment within less period of time with high performance in filed condition. Brassinosteroids are new class hormone which has been studied in plant growth and development. Thus, present study was conducted to evaluate the role of brassinosteroid (Brassinolide) in three sugarcane varieties (Co 0118, Co 98014 and CoS 8272) under in-vitro conditions. The shoot apical meristem was used as explant to initiate culture and further transferred on media supplemented with MS Basal + BAP. The best BAP concentration was used further with different concentrations of BR. The results obtained under study suggested that the MS media supplemented with 4.0 – 5.0 μM of BRs was observed with higher shoot regeneration frequency, number of shoots and shoot length suggesting the best BRs concentration for in-vitro shoot multiplication in sugarcane. The genotype Co 0118 was found to be highly responded. The BRs supplementation was significantly influenced the shoot multiplication suggesting as brassinosteroids as important growth substance for plant development and growth.