Background : Rhododendron brachycarpum belong to Ericaceae family is northern herbaceous plant and grows high in mountains of Korea. Traditionally, this plants have been used to treat arthralgia, neuralgia, hypertension, roborant and diuretic. In spite of medicinal values, natural populations are decresing due to climate change and grows slowly. Therefore it need to secure plant materials and in vitro culture is able to the alternative methods. In this study, we examined the effect of PGRs treatment using leaf and petiole explants.
Methods and Results : The effects of the different surface sterilization agents (NaOCl and HgCl2) and time were tested. Best results with lower contamination and higher explants survival were recorded with 2 - 4% NaOCl for 1 minutes and 0.5 - 1.0% AgNO3. Callus was obtained when cultured onto MS medium using different concentration and combination of 2,4-D, BA and NAA. Maxium induction of callus was obtained from combinations of 2.0 ㎎ l-1 2,4-D and 1.0 - 2.0 ㎎ l-1 BA from leaf explants. Petiole explants were more effective to induce callus than leaf explants from combination of 1.0 ㎎ l-1 2,4-D and 0.1 - 1.0 ㎎ l-1 BA.
Conclusion : The resultes provide that different explants and PGRs combinations were good source of callus induction.