MORPHOLOGICAL, BIOCHEMICAL AND MOLECULAR EVALUATION OF TISSUE CULTURE RAISED CLONAL APPLE ROOTSTOCKS
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Date
2022-11
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UHF,NAUNI
Abstract
ABSTRACT
Apple (Malus × domestica Borkh.) is an important cash crop and has been commercially grown in the
temperate region of the world. For commercial apple production, seedling rootstocks have been used for
propagation for a long time, but now clonal asexually propagated rootstocks have become popular because of
their wider ecological range, early maturity, fruit quality, resistance to diseases and pests, and ability to adapt to
different climates and soils. This makes them better than seedling rootstocks. It is also a cheaper and more
effective way to make clonal rootstocks. To address certain issues related to grafting and performance of tissue
culture raised apples the studies entitled “Morphological, biochemical and molecular evaluation of tissue culture
raised clonal apple rootstocks” were conducted in an experimental field layout maintained by the Department of
Fruit Science having different apple clonal rootstocks viz. M7, M9, MM106, MM111, and Merton 793 have
been produced through in vitro propagation in the Department of Biotechnology, Dr. Yashwant Singh Parmar
University of Horticulture and Forestry, Nauni, Solan, Himachal Pradesh. The morphological parameters
showed that there was no variation in leaf type and shape in apple trees raised on conventionally propagated and
tissue culture raised clonal rootstocks. All the leaves were of Crenate, Crenate to Serrate, and Serrate type and
V-shaped, concave, convex, flat with raised margins and flat shapes. Early flowering was observed in trees
raised on tissue culture propagated rootstocks in comparison with conventionally propagated rootstocks. The
maximum tree height (189.99cm) and inter-node length (4.6cm) were observed in trees raised conventionally
propagated Merton 793 whereas, the maximum leaf area was observed in trees on tissue culture raised M9
(30.11cm2) rootstock. Maximum photosynthesis (13.18μmol/m²/s) was observed in trees raised on
conventionally propagated MM111 rootstock whereas, maximum stomatal conductance (0.20μmol/m²/s) and
transpiration (7.54μmol/m²/s) was recorded in trees raised on conventionally propagated Merton 793. The
biochemical evaluation revealed maximum protein content (3.80mg/g) was recorded in trees raised on tissue
culture raised Merton 793 rootstock. Trees raised on conventionally propagated MM111 rootstock depicted
maximum total sugar (163.67mg/g), reducing sugar (116.91 mg/g), and non-reducing sugar (46.76mg/g). The
maximum Total phenolic content (TPC) (327.74mg/g) in trees raised on tissue culture raised MM106 rootstock
their molecular analysis using RAPD and SCoT primers to draw a similarity between tissue culture raised and
conventionally propagated apple clonal rootstocks grafted with cv. Jeromine. Out of 33 RAPD primers, 18
primers were successful in DNA amplification resulting in 64 amplicons, out of which 58 were monomorphic.
Nineteen out of 36 SCoT primers resulted in DNA amplification leading to 83 amplicons, out of which 36 were
monomorphic and 47 were polymorphic. Maximum Polymorphic Information Content (PIC) value for RAPD
and SCoT primers were found to be 0.207 and 0.225 respectively. Tissue culture raised and conventionally
propagated apple rootstocks grafted with cv. Jeromine was significantly similar at morphological, biochemical,
and molecular levels. Hence tissue culture raised clonal apple rootstocks can be recommended to the farmers for
raising high density apple plantations for commercial gains