Development of Tissue Culture Technique of Panax ginseng C.A.Mey. ‘Kaishusan’

Abstract

This experiment was conducted with the aim of establishing a technique to preserve the original strain by creating a seed strain using tissue culture. For the test material, the tip side, base side, and petiole of undeveloped and developed leaves of 1- and 2-yr-olds were also tested. The expanded 1st-year leaf-petiole plot produced the highest number of somatic embyros. We developed an effective acclimatization method that involved aseptic pre-acclimation in a liquid medium with vermiculite as the support, and then transplanted the culture onto a urethane mat for hydroponics. As a result, the survival rate increased to about 80%. When gibberellic acid was applied to plants that had lost their leaves during hydroponic acclimatization, the next leaf foliated from the buds. The morphology of plants was similar to that of 2-yr-old plants. The number of individuals that developed new leaves increased with a rise in concentration of sucrose added to the liquid medium. After 4 plantlets were planted in a planter, 2 of the 4 plantlets survived until the following year, and 1 of them flowered and set fruits, yielding 7 seeds.