Callus induction and shoot regeneration in Ducrosia anethifolia an important threatened medicinal plant

Ducrosia Anethifolia is a threatened medicinal herb belongs to the family Apiaceae. This important medicinal plant is a native medicinal plant in Iran and has a restricted distribution in the world. It is used to treat of headache and backache in folk medicine. To callus induction, Leaf and lateral bud were used as explants and the Culture media was MS medium supplemented with 3% w/v sucrose, 0.7% w/v agar and 1gl -1 myoinositol at various concentration of cytokinins and auxins. After Five weeks, the calluses were transferred into regeneration medium that included MS medium supplemented with the combination of BA(0.5, 1 and 2 m gl -1 ) and NAA(0, and 0.5 mgl -1 ). The callus percentage, callus size and fresh weight, shoot length and number of shoots per explants were recorded. The analysis of variance showed that explants and media had significant effects on callus induction. The results revealed that the highest percentage (86.7%) of callus induction was created on MS media containing 2mg/l NAA and 1mg/l BA. On the other hand, lateral bud explants gave higher values in callus inducing percentage, fresh weight and size compared to leaf explants. In the case of plant regeneration, results indicated that the longest shoot length (21.6 mm) was exhibited for explants cultured on MS-medium containing 0.5mg/l BA and the highest number of shoots per explants(5.6) was obtained from callus grown on the medium supplemented with 2mg/l BA. Key word: Ducrosia anethifolia, callus induction, regeneration, explants, media