Effect of genotypes and activated charcoal on high frequency <i>in vitro</i> plant regeneration in sugarcane

261-265A series of experiments were conducted to explore the effect of activated charcoal on the in vitro morphogenic response of 3 sugarcane varieties, viz., CoJ 83, CoJ 88 and CoJ 64. The analysis of variance at 5% level of significance indicated that the differences among different varieties and media composition containing different concentrations of activated charcoal were statistically significant. The MS medium supplemented with 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D; 2.5 mg/L), kinetin (Kin; 0.5 mg/L) and activated charcoal (2.0 g/L) recorded maximum percentage of somatic embryogenesis in CoJ 83 (76.01), followed by CoJ 88 (72.56) and CoJ 64 (64.59). While the best plant regeneration was observed on MS medium supplemented with 6-benzylaminopurine (BAP; 0.5 mg/L) and activated charcoal (2.0 g/L) in CoJ 83 (82.32%), followed by CoJ 88 (73.35%) and CoJ 64 (69.20%). Further, maximum percentage of shoot elongation was observed in CoJ 83, followed by CoJ 88 and CoJ 64, on ½ MS medium supplemented with activated charcoal 2.0 g/L. At the same time, it was also noticed that activated charcoal promoted the shoot length in all the varieties and reduced albinism significantly in micropropagated plants. Thus activated charcoal can be added in the plant regeneration media to enhance somatic embryogenesis and plant regeneration. It can efficiently be also used to improve the frequency of shoot multiplication and transformation