EFFECT OF METHOD OF PLANTING OF IN VITRO PLANTLETS ON POTATO MINI-TUBER PRODUCTION UNDER PROTECTED CONDITIONS

摘要

In potato cultivation; availability of healthy planting material is of utmost importance to ensure high productivities. Maintaining the seed stocks free from viruses under conventional (clonal multiplication) system of seed potato production is quitecumbersome. But, the recent advances in micro-propagation (tissue culture) techniques have facilitated the production, multiplication and maintenance of healthy potato clones. In this system, mini-tubers are produced by different ways either by direct transplanting of the whole in vitro plantlets under protected in vivo conditions (Lommen and Struik, 1992) or through aeroponics (Buckseth et a., 2016). Direct planting of in vitro generated plantlets (micro-plants) in soil medium under aphid proof net/ polyhouses has also been reported to be a well established method for the production of potato mini-tubers in the hills as well as plains of India (Sharma et ah, 2013; Kumar et al, 2011). Producing mini-tubers from in vitro plantlets allows a faster rateof multiplication and reduces the number of field generations needed in seed production (Ranalli, 1997).