Regeneration of various species of Crassulaceae, with special reference to Kalanchoë

SummaryFour species of the genus Kalanchoe (Crassulaceae), K. peltata, K. laxiflora, K. tubiflora and K. marmorata, were regenerated from leaf explants by direct organogenesis. Each species was tested on 19 media, all based on MS-medium. One medium was without growth regulators, the remaining 18 contained a combination of auxin and cytokinin. Auxin was indole-3-acetic acid (IAA): 1.1, 2.3 or 4.6 μM (0.2, 0.4 or 0.8 mg l–1). Cytokinin was either 1-phenyl-3-(1,2,3-thidiazol-5-yl)urea(TDZ): 1.1, 2.3 or 4.5 μM (0.25, 0.5 or 1.0 mg l–1), or 6-benzylaminopurine (BAP): 1.1, 2.2 or 4.4 μM (0.25, 0.5 or 1.0 mg l–1). For each species an optimum level of growth regulators were obtained. One medium, called K22, containing 0.5 mg l–1 TDZ and 0.04 mg l–1 IAA, showed good shoot-generating capacity with all four species. Shoot elongation proved to be a problem only with K. marmorata. This could be bypassed by transferring shoots to a gibberellic acid (GA3)-containing medium, or by ventilating the containers. Shoots were ...