Vol. 18 No. 2 (2011): June 2011

Dendronephthya sp. is a soft coral that has huge distribution starting from Indopacific, Tonga, Solomon Islands to Great Barrier Reef in Australia. However, this soft corals survive only in short period after cultivation in artificial habitat (aquarium). Recent study showed that the soft coral Dendronephtya sp. has an association or symbiotic relationship with several bacteria, commonly known as coral associated bacteria (CAB). In this study, we compared the population dynamic of Dendronephthya sp.-associated bacteria in natural and artificial habitat, resulting different bacterial community profiles using terminal restriction fragment length polymorphism (T-RFLP) analysis of bacterial community DNA. There were 15 main classes of bacterial population identified along with uncultured microorganism, uncultured organism, uncultured bacteria and unidentified organism. Members of Actinobacteria, Arthrobacteria, Chlorobia, Caldilineae, d-proteobacteria and Proteobacteria were predicted to give contributions in the survival ability of both Dendronephthya sp. The cultivation of soft corals after 2 weeks in artificial habitat increases bacterial population similarity on 2 different samples by 10%. Bacterial population similarity in artificial habitat would increase along with the longer cultivation time of soft corals.

This research was to study in vitro callus induction and somatic embryogenesis in oil palm from leaf explants. Young leaf segments from mature oil palm were cultured on MS medium supplemented with different concentrations of 2,4-D with or without addition of 2 g/l activated charcoal (AC) or 2,4-D and picloram. Embryogenesis induction was done using MS medium containing 2,4-D 450 mM and benziladenine 4.4 mM with 3g/l activated charcoal. The treatment of 2,4-D 15 mM resulted in the highest percentage of callus induction. The treatment of 2,4-D and AC showed that 2,4-D 450 mM and AC led to higher percentage of callus induction than that of 2,4-D 400 mM and 2 g/l AC. Embryogenesis occured in 27 out of 250 clumps of primary callus was occurred after 2-3 times subcultures. Somatic embryo development occurred when the embryogenic callus was transferred on the same basal medium supplemented with casein hydrolysate with 1 mM BA or growth regulator free basal medium with 2 g/l activated charcoal.

Biological control of bacterial wilt pathogen (Ralstonia solanacearum) of tomato using endophytic bacteria is one of the alternative control methods to support sustainable agriculture. This study was conducted to select and characterize endophytic bacteria isolated from healthy tomato stems and to test their ability to promote plant growth and suppress bacterial wilt disease. Among 49 isolates successfully isolated, 41 were non-plant pathogenic. Green house test on six selected isolates based on antagonistic effect on R. solanacearum or ability to suppress R. solanacearum population in dual culture assays obtained BC4 and BL10 isolates as promising biocontrol agents.  At six weeks after transplanting, plants treated with BC4 isolate showed significantly lower disease incidence (33%) than that of control (83%). Plants height was not significantly affected by endophytic bacterial treatments. Based on 16S rRNA sequence, BC4 isolate had 97% similarity with Staphylococcus epidermidis (accession number EU834240.1), while isolate BL10 had 98% similarity with Bacillus amyloliquefaciens strain JK-SD002 (accession number AB547229.1).

Phalaenopsis is one of the most interesting genera of orchids due to the members are often used as parents to produce hybrids. The establishment and development of highly reliable and discriminatory methods for identifying species and cultivars has become increasingly more important to plant breeders and members of the nursery industry. The aim of this research was to develop sequence-based microsatellite (eSSR) markers for the Phalaenopsis orchid designed from the sequence of GenBank NCBI. Seventeen primers were designed and thirteen primers pairs could amplify the DNA giving the expected PCR product with polymorphism. A total of 51 alleles, with an average of 3 alleles per locus and polymorphism information content (PIC) values at 0.674, were detected at the 16 SSR loci. Therefore, these markers could be used for identification of the Phalaenopsis orchid used in this study. Genetic similarity and principle coordinate analysis identified five major groups of Phalaenopsis sp. the first group consisted of P. amabilis, P. fuscata, P. javanica, and P. zebrine. The second group consisted of P. amabilis, P. amboinensis, P. bellina, P. floresens, and P. mannii. The third group consisted of P. bellina, P. cornucervi, P. cornucervi, P. violaceae sumatra, P. modesta. The forth group consisted of P. cornucervi and P. lueddemanniana, and the fifth group was P. amboinensis.

Tissue culture technique was used to obtain salt tolerant variants from embryogenic calluses of sugarcane (Saccharum sp. var. CP48-103) that cultured on a selective medium containing different levels of NaCl (0, 0.2, 0.4, 0.6, and 0.8% NaCl). A total of four plants regenerated from the tolerant calluses were selected but the best of them in vigor grown in in vitro and hydroponic systems under salinity stress to comparison with source variety. With increasing supply of NaCl in both systems, root growth was more adversely affected than was shoot growth. Chlorophyll contents showed a decreasing trend and dry matter yield of plants reduced but in a slow rate in tolerant somaclonal than source variety. The biochemical analysis showed that at high salt concentration, Cl- and Na+ content in shoot and root increased. With rising salt concentration from 0 to 0.8%, content of Cl- in shoot and root of tolerant variant changed lower than parent showed that this variant had genetic lowest ratio of shoot/root chloride and had minimum transport of Cl- to shoots. Also this variant had high content of Ca2+ in shoot and high K+/Na+ ratio at all salinity levels. Thus it probably has genetic potential to avoid harmful ions uptake.