colchine and other mutagens

[Smiling Cloud]

Anyone know an australian supplier of colchine or an equiv. Does it really make plants (in general) bigger?

[Darklight]

Any of the major biotech houses, including Sigma. It's not a 'problem' to get as such, but its a bitch to use and requires careful handling. Ploidy experiments can do all sorts of things to a plant, including kill it. I don't have any experience with such techniques myself, I'm going from 2ndhand experience

[Andrew]

Find someone who suffers from gout.My brother had a short period of gout and I,m sure the pills he was given contained this.It will kill most of your plants.

[Torsten]

when ordering stuff like this, make sure you get the spelling right. I think you probbaly mean cholchicine. It is derived from Colchicum spp.

Thee is a fine line between polyploidy and death. Don't expect more than one in a thousand seeds to survive.

[G Dawg]

Read something awhile back about the use of the hebicide oryzalin to produce polypoidy in bulbous plants when used as 0.001% part of sterile medium ( in tissue culture? )

Will find reference if your interested.

Later.

[shroomy]

and did i not read somwhere that the cholchicine in the gout pills is derived from the Autumn Crocus plant.

[waterdragon]

i always thought it was spelled colchicine. did a google search and found it spelled both ways. what gives?

[Torsten]

bugger, that was a typo. it was meant to be colchicine not cholchicine. The latter doesn't make any sense when derived from the genus name.

The autumn crocus is Colchicum autumnale, btw.

[Guest VENDEJO]

what you're obviously looking for is crocus bulbs which are called "corms" - to squeeze out some colchicine.

Try SEARCHING for "Corms" on the net.

Good luck - let us know if you find them!

[Torsten]

I actually thought bulbs were called bulbs and corms were called corms

[Guest reville]

Ny other slightly safer teratogens available OTC?

mmmm

what if we applied it to a callus like that found on trichocereus

or to the meristem of a growing plant

the outcome would be visble unlike the seed where you may expect significant variation even amongst fairly inbred plants

i can think of interesting possible outcomes on trichocereus, lophophora,cannabis, salvia divinorum

and of course pawpaws

ive always wanted to make a polyploid carica so i could cross the hardy mountain papayas with the tasty carica papaya

a few are hybrids anyhow so it might work

(eg the babaco- carica pentagona)

[Guest reville]

well how dumb can i be..

a 'safer teratogen'

nice little oxymoron to start the day

[G Dawg]

Originally posted by reville:

what if we applied it to a callus like that found on trichocereus

or to the meristem of a growing plant

the outcome would be visble unlike the seed where you may expect significant variation even amongst fairly inbred plants

I think one of the problems with working with larger/older plants is that a large area has less chance of uniformally mutating, thus resulting in patches of differing ploidy over the plant.

Might have somthing to do with the rapid division/growth of cells in seedlings that make seeds good working material and also the toxicity of some mutagens probably makes seeds more economical due to losses.

Later.

[Darklight]

Embryonic tissue is more 'plastic' than older tissue apaprantly. More responsive to lower doses of hormones & stuff, more consistent to replicate when acceptable mutation is achieved.

[Guest VENDEJO]

At this point let me digress for a moment and warn you about the dangers of colchicine. It is a very powerful poison and could kill you easily. Use rubber gloves when handling it and don't get in your eyes or on your skin. If you do get it on yourself, wash it off immediately with soap and water. Keep the solution in a bottle with a tight cap, and as with all poison, including your insecticides, don't leave it lying around where children can get into it. You can buy the bottle, filter paper, a pair of tweezers, and an eyedropper at a hobby or toy store where chemistry equipment is sold. Never use these things around the house for anything else

Chapter "Artificial Mutations", by C.E.Faber

[theobromos]

And remember you could die from a dose you can only just see.

[Guest Trichus]

Slightly off topic again...Move it if you like.

This is my theoretical problem-

There was a male(lets cal them species X)

plant, (haploid) and a female that was triploid.

The male is from a hard to source strain and is quite desirable. The female was the only one of around 30 seeds in a batch that survived (possibly because of a larger size and drought problems).

What will the offspring be like, and would it be possible to save the good qualities (eg aroma etc) that may appear while going backwards down the ploidy path?

Im only new to this-

thanks

[Auxin]

My $0.02 (USD)

Yes Colchicine is very, very poisonous. Not just that, but it mutates HUMAN sperm, eggs, and fetuses. We have too much DNA for tetraploidy so colchicine causes massive unfavorable mutations in live fetuses, or future fetuses via the mutant sperm/eggs. It also does other nasty things. Rubber gloves are not enough, especially when working with the solid form (dances on static and flies in air!!!). When I work with the solid I use chemical fume hood, chemical goggles, chemical apron, nitrile gloves, chemical dust respirator, and access to both emergency eyewash and shower stations.

I do not advise its use except by skilled chemists (biologist say they know how to use it safely, but my observations show the contrary.)

The solution I use for polyploid induction in seed is fresh 0.1% (aq) colchicine for 12-24hrs, at 15 C, IN THE DARK, then wash the seeds off. This kills all but 5-20% of the seeds, most of the remainder are polyploids.

Colchicine is destroyed by light, acid, and base. A/B extraction of autumn crocus (Colchicum autumnale) corms is futile. Extraction of an active, non-chloroform compounded product is hard and requires lots of equiptment.

Corms harvested in early summer have about 0.25% colchicine. Like I said- very dangerous, do not mess with this stuff.

One experement I have been intending to try (but do not advocate) is to grind up a peeled corm with an equal weight of distilled water, let sit in the dark 12 hrs, add the seeds (put 'em under the surface of course.) [This might only work for larger seeds, because finding small ones in the mush would be hard and increasingly dangerous] and let the seeds soak in the mush, in the dark for 12-24hrs, then find 'em, wash 'em, plant 'em, and pray you can still have normal babies. I might try this idea in a few months with some Capsicum chinese var. fatalii and grow it indoors until the following spring.

To emphasise my main message:

Don't mess around with colchicine. Really, Really don't do it: BAD, BAD, BAD.

[Darklight]

Originally posted by Auxin:

Don't mess around with colchicine. Really, Really don't do it: BAD, BAD, BAD.

My sentiments zackly auxin. You're working ag/ hort sci? Not TC by any chance?

[theobromos]

Capsicum chinese var. fatalii sounds like a deadly chili

[waterdragon]

some good info auxin. i've read a hundred times that it was dangerous but never with such detail.

[waterdragon]

speaking of TC your darkness, what happened to the write up on the ethno 2002 speech of yours?

[Darklight]

Originally posted by waterdragon:

what happened to the write up on the ethno 2002 speech of yours?

WD! Kittycat! Howareya?

Torsten has very kindly donated some webspace for it, but I'm too stupid to figure out where to upload it to. When he gets a chance I'll get him to sort my puter out so it plays nicely with others, but he's flat strap at the moment so it'll have to wait.

It zips down to about half a MB, and you'll need powerpoint viewer if you don't have Powerpoint. But I'll email it to you if yer in a hurry, just let me know

BTW Auxin, been meaning to ask. Did you get that name because you induce roots?

[Torsten]

Originally posted by Darklight:

Did you get that name because you induce roots?

Oh dear..... Celibacy getting to you again

[Darklight]

mumble mumble mumble it only took a couple of days mumble mumble. They just don't make psychopaths like they used to

Torsten you're an absolute CAD!