Rooting of in vitro developed shoots was achieved relatively easily with Murashige and Skoog basal medium rather than with auxin-enriched media. Direct, high-frequency shoot formation on intact leaves of shoots grown on 6-benzylaminopurine and kinetin-supplemented media, an unusual and novel observation made in this study, occurred in all the species studied. Incorporation of paclobutrazol in the shoot multiplication medium was necessary to recover healthy and robust shoots suitable for rooting. Shoot tips obtained from in vitro germinated seedlings, adventitious shoots or somatic embryo-derived plantlets, when cultured on Murashige and Skoog medium enriched with 1 μM 6-benzylaminopurine, 2 μM kinetin, 0.5 μM indole-3-butyric acid and 4 mg-1 paclobutrazol multiplied three-fold within 3-4 weeks in culture. purpurea were regenerated by three methods, namely axillary bud proliferation, adventitious shoot formation and somatic embyrogenesis. Key words: In vitro propagation Purple coneflower DOI: Tropical Agricultural Research and Extension 13(2) 2010 pp.29-32Įfficient in vitro procedures for mass propagation of four commercially important Echinacea species have been deveoped. Through this culture system, it was possible to obtain at least one million plantlets ready for transplantation within one year.

It was found that explants taken from plantlets of different maturity had different adventitious bud regeneration ability, with those from two and a half months old plantlets having the highest regeneration ability, and with root explants having the highest number of adventitious buds regenerated.

In the system, adventitious buds were first regenerated from leaf, petiole and root explants of aseptic seedlings on MS medium with 0.3 mg/l BA and 0.01 mg/l NAA, and then these adventitious buds were rooted and grown into more mature plantlets on MS media with 0.01 mg/l NAA for providing more explant materials for a subsequent adventitious bud regeneration culture.

An efficient in vitro propagation culture system was developed for purple coneflower.

Dark purple coneflower