Vegetos

Abstract

Micro-propagation can be exploited for maintenance and mass multiplication of gynoe-cious lines in bitter gourd for hybrid seed pro-duction. Therefore, standardization of protocol for rapid in vitro multiplication will also help in development of double haploid (DH) plants in bitter gourd, which may enhance the ability to develop homozygosity in a short period particu-larly for gynoecious trait. Among the explants, the shoot tip performed better than the nodal explant in all respects. T₄ treatment, which is a combination of spray of gentamycin (100 mg/l) + agitation of explants in carbendazim (0.2%) + Mancozeb (0.2%) HQC (200 mg/l) is best for the pretreatment of cultures. Among the stages, 45 days old explants are comparative better than 60 days old. Treatment with mercuric chloride (HgCl₂) for 3 minutes duration recorded the maximum in vitro survival of the shoot tip of DBGy-201 (57.96%).