In vitro REGENERATION OF TOMATO (Lycopersicon esculentum Mill)

A protocol was developed for shoot multiplication and regeneration in two tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum) cultivars. Shoots tips of about 2 cm length from in vitro establishment seedlings were used in the multiplication experiments. The explants were transferred into Murashige and Skoog media (MS medium) with (2.2, 4.4 µM) Benzyl adenine (BA), (9.2, 18.4 µM) Kinetin combined with 0.0, 2.7 µM Naphthalene acetic acid (NAA). Higher shoot number (8.4) was obtained with MS medium supplied with 18.6 µM Kinetin. For regeneration experiments, hypocotyl, cotyledon, stem, and leaf explants of both cultivars were used. Explants were cultured on MS media supplied with different levels of Naphthalene acetic acid (NAA) and Benzyl adenine (BA), Kinetin (Kin) and N-1,2,3-Thiadiazol-5-yl-N’-phenylurea(TDZ) Direct regeneration from the different expants was obtained on MS basal medium supplemented with TDZ at (0, 1, 2 and 4 µM) and NAA at (0, 2.7 and 5.4 µM), or BA at (0.0 or 2.2 µM) and Kinetin at (0.0, 2.3 µM). The highest shoot % (62.25) was obtained when Kinetin and BA were used at (2.3 and 2.2 µM) respectively. However, when NAA and TDZ were combined, 39.9 and 46.91% shoot regeneration was achieved with 2.7 and 4 µM, respectively for both Baladi and 593 cultivars. Very low shoot regeneration was observed with all NAA levels combined with 1 and 2 µM TDZ.