Anuja Rijal* , Neela Paudel, Bihani Thapa, Kabita Kisi, Prakash Bhattarai and Giridhari Subedi
National Potato Research Program
*Corresponding author's email: anu.rij013@gmail.com
*ORCID iD: 0000-0002-6073-3770

Abstract

Plant tissue culture is a technology for the production of disease free planting materials but it is constricted by the high cost of production. A laboratory experiment was carried out to evaluate the use of Ispaghol (Plantago ovata) as a substitute for agar which is used as a gelling agent for the solidification of plant growth media for the in-vitro mass propagation. This study was aimed at identifying the potential use of a cheaper substitute for agar in the tissue culture media. The experiment was performed using different amount of ispaghol (10g/l, 15 g/l, 20 g/l) and agar @8 g/l as a control for the two successive seasons. One explant per tube was used in the experiment. Plant growth parameters like shoot length, number of nodes per plant and number of leaves per plant was recorded. The results showed that the production of healthy plantlets in the ispaghol gelled media @ 15g/l and @20 g/l was statistically at par with the agar solidified media. Cost of production was compared and ispaghol was found to be 11.4 times cheaper. The resembling performance of ispaghol and agar as a gelling agent in the tissue culture media for the growth of potato plantlets fully suggests that ispaghol husk has solidifying qualities like agar that ultimately could reduce the cost of production of in-vitro plantlets.