Betacyanin concentrations in young cell cultures from Portulaca grandiflora - an analysis of variation.

From seedlings of two violet flowering, inbred lines of Portulaca grandiflora hypocotyls were isolated and then halved by cross sections. On a modified Murashige-Skoog medium the pairs of segments frequently yielded "quartetts" of primary calli from the four cut surfaces. After some subcultivations of these groups, the betacyanin concentrations of cell cultures were measured and subjected to several statistical methods.In 5.0 per cent of all cell cultures belonging to line L and in 2.1 per cent of those derived from line H extremely high and low concentrations were caused by the in vitro conditions. Some other ones are obviously due to the character of seedlings used for experiment L 2.Furthermore it is statistically detectable that the cell culture coming from the basipetal cut of a hypocotyl segment is superior to the cell culture of acropetal origin with regard to betacyanin concentration. These differences indicate the polarization of physiological conditions in the hypocotyl segments.