COMPARISON OF SOMATIC MUTATION FREQUENCIES IN THE STAMEN HAIRS OF ONE MUTABLE AND 2 STABLE CLONES OF TRADESCANTIA TREATED WITH SMALL DOSES OF GAMMA-RAYS

Induced somatic pink mutation frequencies in the stamen hairs of Tradescantia KU 20 clone, a blue/pink heterozygote highly mutable spontaneously at lower temperature, were studied after treating with relatively small doses of Co-60 gamma rays (39 to 551 mGy or 3.9 to 55.1 rad), and were compared with those of two stable clones (non-mutable spontaneously), BNL 02 and KU 9, which are also blue/pink heterozygotes. It was found that the gamma-ray-induced mutation frequency in KU 20 clone was comparable (18.8 pink mutant events per 10(4) hair-cell divisions per Gy) to those in BNL 02 (12.2 and 21.2) and KU 9 (17.4) clones, when the spontaneous mutation frequencies of KU 20 clone were relatively low (at most about 5.7 and 2.3 times of BNL 02 and KU 9 clones, respectively). However, when the spontaneous mutation frequecies of KU 20 clone were much higher (up to about 65 and 27 times of BNL 02 and KU 9 clones, respectively), induced mutation frequency was significantly higher in KU 20 clone (58.8 pink mutant events per 10(4) hair-cell divisions per Gy) than in BNL 02 and KU 9 clones. The extent of increase in the gamma-ray-induced mutation frequency in the latter case was nevertheless very much less than the increase in the spontaneous mutation frequency, suggesting different mechanisms of initiation and repair of radiation-induced and spontaneous mutations