Aquatic plants are grown in aquaria for their beauty and to maintain the quality of water. The explants of Lobelia cardinalis L. were obtained from the Aquatic Plant Center Co., Ltd., Thailand. In vitro clonal propagation offers alternative strategy for its rapid clonal multiplication. In this study, multiple and rapid propagations of Lobelia cardinalis L. with tissue culture techniques were aimed. Highly efficient and repeatable in vitro regeneration protocol was established from nodal segments of Lobelia cardinalis L. Various concentrations and combinations of various plant growth regulators (PGRs) were employed to induce multiple shoots, shoot elongation, number of leaves and rooting of shoots to obtain complete plantlets of Lobelia cardinalis L. Among 2 PGRs such as 6-benzylaminopurine (BAP) and α-Naphthalene acetic acid (NAA) tested for multiple shoot induction. Regenerated shoots had a higher number of shoots on MS medium contained cytokinins with auxins. The maximum shoot proliferation (100 %), number of shoots per explant (6.20 ± 0.51 shoots), shoot length (11.67 ± 0.69 mm) and number of leaves per explant (58.10 ± 0.38 leaves per explant) were observed in MS medium supplemented with 1.0 mg/L BAP and 2.0 mg/L NAA. Rooting was achieved within 3 to 4 weeks on all the rooting media, but MS medium augmented with 1.0 mg/L indole-3-butyric acid (IBA) produced the maximum number of strong and healthy roots (11.70 ± 0.27 roots). The regenerated complete plantlets with healthy roots and shoot system were transferred to 3.5 cm diameter black net plastic pots containing rockwool medium and successfully acclimatized with a survival rate of 100 % in the greenhouse and no phenotypic variations were observed among regenerated plants. The success of this protocol offers highly efficient method of the plant multiplication, which would be beneficial for plant tissue culturist, and nursery people where regular supply of plants is a large number required. This protocol can be utilized for commercial scale propagation.
HIGHLIGHTS
Micropropagation was established from nodal segments of Lobelia cardinalis L
The maximum shoot proliferation, number of shoots per explant, shoot length and number of leaves per explant were observed in MS medium supplemented with 1.0 mg/L BAP and 2.0 mg/L NAA
MS medium augmented with 1.0 mg/L indole-3-butyric acid (IBA) produced the maximum number of roots
The regenerated plantlets were successfully acclimatized with a survival rate of 100 % in the greenhouse
GRAPHICAL ABSTRACT