Improvement of pomegranate (punica granatum l.) to cold resistant through in vitro mutation

Abstract

In Kazakhstan, a large pool of fruit trees is grown, one of which is the pomegranate (Punica granatum L.). The most significant limiting factor of pomegranate cultivation in Kazakhstan is the frosty winter, as well as low temperatures in spring and autumn. In order to obtain mutants resistant to low positive temperatures, chemical mutagenesis was used, with ethyl methanesulfonate (EMS) as the mutagen. Callus was treated with mutagen in vitro culture. In the Akdona cultivar, the survival rate of callus was 25.45% at the concentration of 3 µM of EMS mutagen, 31.67% at the concentration of 6 µM, and 24.35% at 9 µM. Plant regeneration was induced from mutagen-treated calluses. The resulting plants were exposed to low positive temperatures (4°C, for 30 days). After exposure to cold, the maximum survival rate of mutant plants of the Akdona cultivar was 58%, and the minimum survival rate was 3% for plants of the Pg1 line. The resulting mutant pomegranate plants will be used for breeding for cold resistance.