Abstract:
Celastrus paniculatus, belonging to the family Celastraceae, is an important threatened medicinal plant in
Sri Lanka. Owing to the increasing demand from the pharmaceutical industry, the species is being
overexploited and become a threatening species. Poor seed viability and low germination restricts its
propagation through sexual methods. Therefore, alternative approaches such as in vitro techniques are
highly desirable for large-scale propagation of this medicinally important plant. Nodal segments, obtained
from a shade house grown mature plant, were used as explants for shoot induction. Shoot multiplication
was achieved by repeated transfer of explants and sub culturing of invitro produced shoots on Murashige
and Skoog (MS) medium supplemented with various concentrations of 6-benzylaminopurine [BAPJ alone
or in combination with auxin fNaphthalene acetic acid [NAA) and Thidiazuron [TDZ)). The maximum
number of shoots (35.75 I 2.58) was observed on MS medium supplemented with TDZ (0.1 mg L-11 for six
months period. In vitro derived shoots were rooted underex virro conditions after treating them with
indole-3-butyric acid [300 mg L-1) for 3 min on coco-pel]et. Over 90 0/o of plantlets acclimatized
successfully under high humid conditions. The protocol discussed could be effectively employed for large scale multiplication of C. paniculatus.
