Abstract
Seeds of fox glove Digitalis lanata were irradiated with gamma ray with the dose 25, 50 grey in addition to the treatment of the comparison 0 grey, BA was also used at the concentrations of 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 mg. L−1 to determine the effectiveness of the gamma ray and BA and their interaction in stimulating the proportion, speed of seed germination and production of Cardiac glycosides, chlorophyll and carbohydrates in the vegetative branches of the plantlet implanted on the nutritional media. The results showed that the irradiation at the dose of 50 grey was significantly increased the rate of germination percent to 100% and the speed of germination by a rate of 5 seeds / day, compared with control group which gave 30% and 1.1 seeds / day respectively. The same treatment had a significant increase on the rate of production of Digoxin, Digitoxin and Gitoxin glycosides to 45.54, 91.87 and 68.70 μg. g−1 respectively, compared to control group values of 6.40, 20.17 and 13.09 μg.−1 g respectively. The same treatment achieved a significant increase in the total chlorophyll and carbohydrate production rate of 2.10 and 3.80 mg g−1 respectively, compared with the control group values of 1.30 and 2.82 mg. g−1 respectively. Also the benzyl adenine at a concentration of 3 mg.L−1 increased the rate of the same glycoside compounds which to 58.57, 79.15 and 78.14 μg. g−1 respectively, compared to the control values of 25.97, 56.02 and 40.90 μg. g−1 respectively. Also, the concentration of total chlorophyll and carbohydrates was 2.74 and 4.39 mg. g−1 respectively, compared to the control group values of 1.70 and 3.31 mg. g−1 respectively. As for the effect of the interference of irradiation treatment at 3 mg. g−1 concentration with adenine on Digoxin and Gitoxin the concentrations were 79.11 and 118.20 μg. g−1, respectively, and the chlorophyll concentration was 3.65 mg. g−1. The irradiation treatment at 4 mg. L−1 achieved the highest concentration of Digitoxin (118.23 μg. g−1) and the highest concentration of carbohydrates of (5.13 mg. g−1).
