STM Article Repository

Leptadenia reticulata of family Asclepiadeaceae is an endangered medicinal plant which has been used in traditional medicine from ancient times. In the present study the genetic fidelity, antioxidant enzyme activity and proline content of in vitro regenerated and field grown plants were analyzed. Out of 40 randomly amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) primers tested, only 6 primers produced species specific reproducible and unique bands. A similarity matrix based on Jaccard’s coefficient ranged from 0.88 to 1.0 indicates the higher percentage of similarity and genetic homogeneity between tissue cultured and mother plants. Antioxidant enzyme activity like Superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase (CAT) and peroxidase were investigated to evaluate the protective mechanism of the plant against oxidative stress. SOD and peroxidase activity were found to be higher in acclimatized in vitro raised plantlets whereas highest catalase activity was observed in ex vivo grown plants. Maximum proline content (0.24µg/g) was found in acclimatized in vitro raised plantlets than in naturally grown plants (0.14µg/g). The higher degree of genetic similarity of in vitro raised plantlets encourages the use of current micropropagation protocol for L. reticulata. Result from the study of antioxidant enzyme activity and proline content may serve as biomarker for assessing the physiological parameters in L. reticulata.