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Abstract Six in vitro experiments were carried out during the period 1997-2000 with the two garlic cultivars Balady and Chinese. Results of these experiments could be summerized as follow: 1- Exp.l was conducted to study the effect of medium type (MS, BDS and B5) on the in vitro growth of garlic. Results showed that using MS medium generally outperformed the other media in increasing number of leaves and leaf length as well as number of roots and root length from the cultured garlic explants of both cultivars. The in vitro growth of Balady explants was significantly better than that of Chinese cv. 2- Exp. 2 was performed to study the effect of explant source on the in vitro growth of garlic. Results obtained revealed that using stem disc explants was superior over shoot tips in terms of number of leaves, leaf length, number of roots and root length. Results also showed that rooting only occurred from stem disc explants but not from shoot tips. 3- Exp. 3 was carried out to study the effect of explant storage at several temperatures (5,10, 20°C and at room temperature) for one month on subsequent in vitro growth. Cold storage of mother cloves at 5°C significantly increased number of leaves, leaf length, number of roots and root length of the stem disc explants for both cultivars as compared to explant stored at the other temperatures. 4- Exp. 4. In this study, the effect of sucrose concentration in the tissue culture medium was tested on the in vitro growth and multishoot formation. Sucrose at 60 g/l significantly increased number, of leaves and leaf length. Sucrose at 60 or 90 g/l increased root and length, while at 120 g/l, sucrose had negative effect on rooting. The number of shoot clumps produced’ and their dry weights were higher with 60-90 gjl sucrose compared to 30 or 120 g/l sucrose. The responses of both cultivars to sucrose concentration were the same for most growth parameters. 5- Exp. 5 was performed to examine the influence of slicing the stem disc explant on the in vitro growth, multishoot formation and bulblet production in comparison with the intact stem disc explants. Results clearly demonstrated the positive effect of slicing the stem disc explant. This treatment significantly increased the total leaves number and leaf length, root numbers and length as well as number of shoot clumps produced. When the shoot clumps were cultured in MS medium amended with 120 g/l sucrose, bulblet were formed abundantly within one month. The Balady cv produced more bulblets but the average bulblet weight and diameter were larger in Chinese than Balady cv. 6- The sixth experiment was conducted to study the effect of the duration of cold storage of mother cloves for 2,3 and 4 months at 4°C on subsequent in vitro growth and bulblet formation. The obtained results demonstrated that cold storage of garlic cloves for 2 or 3 months had no effect on leaves number and length as compared with the storage at room temperature. |