In vitro propagation of a medicinal plant- mango ginger (Curcuma amada Roxb.)

Key words: Mango ginger, rhizome explants, in vitro propagation, medicinal plant. This paper describes efficient in vitro propagation protocol of Curcuma amada Roxb., an important aromatic zingiberaceous plant in the countries of Indian subcontinent, using rhizome explants. Rhizome tip explants showed better response than rhizome bud explants in terms of shoot proliferation and hence excised rhizome tip explants were inoculated aseptically on Murashige and Skoog’s (MS) medium supplemented with different 6-Benzyl adenine (BA) or 6-furfurylamino purine (Kn) concentrations (0.0, 2.0, 4.0, 6.0, 8.0, 10.0 µM) alone or in combinations with α- Naphthalene acetic acid (NAA) and Indole-3-butyric acid (IBA) (1.0, 1.5, 2.0 µM). Optimum proliferation was obtained on MS medium having 8.0 µM BA + 1.0 µM NAA. Shoot proliferation was maximal (99.8%) with 10.6 ± 0.26 shoots per explant after 6 weeks of culture. The successfully proliferated shoots with an average height of 38 cm were transferred to rooting medium augmented with NAA and IBA at four different concentrations (2.0, 4.0, 6.0, 8.0 µM) and 4.0 µM IBA was found to be best for in vitro adventitious rooting. Rooted plantlets were then transferred to plastic cups containing autoclaved garden soil and compost (1:1), gradually acclimatized and finally transferred to the field condition with 80 % survival rate