Download Complete Issue - Academic Journals
Download Complete Issue - Academic Journals
Download Complete Issue - Academic Journals
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
2444 J. Med. Plants Res.<br />
production of desirable medicinal compounds from plants<br />
(Ramachandra and Ravishankar, 2002). On a global<br />
scale, medicinal plants are mainly used as crude drugs<br />
and extracts. Several of the more potent and active<br />
substances are employed as isolated compounds,<br />
including many alkaloids such as morphine (pain killer),<br />
codeine (antitussive), papaverine (phosphordiesterase<br />
inhibitor) and various types of cardiac glycosides (heart<br />
insufficiency) (Wink et al., 2005). The capacity for plant<br />
cell, tissue, and organ cultures to produce and<br />
accumulate many of the same valuable chemical<br />
compounds as the parent plant in nature has been<br />
recognized almost since the inception of in vitro<br />
technology. The strong and growing demand in today’s<br />
market place for natural, renewable products has<br />
refocused attention on in vitro plant materials as potential<br />
factories for secondary phytochemical products, and has<br />
paved the way for new research exploring secondary<br />
product expression in vitro. Plant-produced secondary<br />
compounds have been incorporated into a wide range of<br />
commercial and industrial applications, and fortuitously,<br />
in many cases, rigorously controlled plant in vitro cultures<br />
can generate the same valuable natural products. Plants<br />
and plant cell cultures have served as resources for<br />
flavors, aromas and fragrances, biobased fuels and<br />
plastics, enzymes, preservatives, cosmetics<br />
(cosmeceuticals), natural pigments, and bioactive<br />
compounds (Karuppusamy, 2009).<br />
In the present investigation, this paper describes the<br />
isolation of the secondary metabolite (betalain pigment)<br />
from the callus mass of Z. decandra by altering various<br />
growth hormones and adjuvants.<br />
MATERIALS AND METHODS<br />
Z. decandra L. were collected from in and around Mysore University<br />
campus, Karnataka and maintained as stock plants in the<br />
Departmental garden. Stem explants were utilized for investigation.<br />
Explants were thoroughly washed in running tap water for 30 min<br />
followed by 5% (v/v) liquid detergent laboline for 5 min. Then<br />
washed in distilled water and followed by surface sterilization in<br />
0.1% (w/v) mercuric chloride solution for 2 to 3 min for stem<br />
explants. After surface disinfection the material was thoroughly<br />
washed in sterile distilled water 4 times. Then stem explants were<br />
aseptically cut into pieces of required sizes and they were<br />
inoculated on MS medium supplemented with different<br />
concentrations and combinations of auxins and cytokinins. All the<br />
media contained 3% (w/v) sucrose. All the cultures were maintained<br />
at the temperature of 25±2°C under 16 h photoperiod and<br />
maintained for the callus formation.<br />
For realizing the pigments the following experiment has been<br />
done. The weight of violet red coloured callus obtained has been<br />
measured. 862 mg of fresh weight (FW) of callus having violet red<br />
colour was aseptically removed from the culture flask, macerated<br />
and extracted the pigment with cold water (temperature