IN VITRO GERMINATION OF DIFFERENT VARIETIES OF GOSSYPIUM POLLEN GRAIN

Abstract

Cotton is one of the most commercial crops playing a key role in economic, political and social affairs of the world. To alleviate environmental stress-related yield reductions, a better understanding of the relative sensitivities of pollen development, dehiscence, pollen germination, pollen tube growth, fertilization, and subsequent boll development is needed. Number of pollen grains viable to germinate at the time of germination after their deposition on stigma is an important event in the process of fertilization leading to formation of fruits and seeds. Progress in identifying the sensitivities of these developmental stress responses has been hampered in part by the lack of a rapid and reliable method of germinating Gossypium varieties pollen in vitro. Since pollen grains of a large number of species readily germinate invitro on a simple medium, in-vitro germination has been extensively used in studies on structural and physiological details of germination and tube growth.