Abstract
Anther culture of Datura innoxia Mill, has permitted the obtention of spontaneous diploid androgenic plants which
produced the tropane alkaloids. The source plants (zygotic diploid) showed no significant
variations in the leaf alkaloid content. On the contrary, androgenic diploid plants
obtained after the first cycle of androgenesis showed important quantitative and qualitative
variations in the leaf alkaloid content. Thus, androgenesis was found to induce a
large variation in the accumulation of these secondary metabolites in the leaves.
It has also permitted the obtention of tropane alkaloid-overproductive plants, particularly
rich in scopolamine. The analyses of zygotic plants obtained from seed germination
of the first cycle androgenic plants have shown that this variability is transmissible
by simple cross-pollination. The analyses of androgenic diploid plants obtained after
the second cycle of androgenesis also showed variations in the leaf alkaloid content.
In vitro androgenesis, therefore, clearly induced variability in the leaf alkaloid content
of the androgenic plants. The role of in vitro androgenesis in inducing variability has been discussed.
