TY - JOUR ID - TI - Molecular analysis of Peganum harmala L. callus to determine the gene expression of beta-carboline alkaloids harmine and harmaline AU - H. H. Mutasher AU - H. J. Attiya PY - 2019 VL - 60 IS - 11 SP - 2410 EP - 2417 JO - Iraqi Journal of Science المجلة العراقية للعلوم SN - 00672904 23121637 AB - The external signals are used as elicitors that can modify the levels of secondarymetabolites production and trigger the biotechnological enforcements to improveplant production. In this study, sodium chloride NaCl was used as a stimulatingfactor for the production of beta-carboline alkaloids, harmine and harmaline, inPeganum harmala. The in vitro induced callus of P. harmalain was used as a sourcefor alkaloid production in the stimulating experiments with sodium chloride. Theresults illustrated that 2 mg.l-1 of NaCl increased the fresh and dry weight of calluswith an average of 944.30 and 72.0 mg, respectively. In a comparative analysisthrough Gas Chromatography (GC), high concentrations of harmine of 58.55 μg.g-1from the root and 56.50μg.g-1 from stem callus were recorded upon treatment with 4mg.l-1 of NaCl. Treatment with 4 mg.l-1 NaCl also showed an increased amount ofharmaline concentration in both root and stem, with values of 2.72 and 2.65 μg.g-1,respectively. The analysis and calculation of gene expression by real-time PCR ofRNA showed that the induced stem callus had a high gene expression with a copynumber of 229,030. While in the root, the effect of higher salinity increased thepercentage of alkaloids without increasing the copy number of gene expression.

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