Abstract

POSADA, PAULA; OCAMPO, JOHN  and  SANTOS, LUIS GUILLERMO. Estudio del comportamiento fisiológico de la semilla de tres especies cultivadas de Passiflora L. (Passifloraceae) como una contribución para la conservación ex situStudy of the physiological behavior of the seeds of three cultivated species of Passiflora L. (Passifloraceae) for contribution to ex situ conservation. rev.colomb.cienc.hortic. [online]. 2014, vol.8, n.1, pp.9-19. ISSN 2011-2173.

Yellow (P. edulis f. flavicarpa), sweet (P. ligularis) and purple passion fruits (P. edulis f. edulis) are economically the main species of the Passiflora L. genus with edible fruits that are marketed in local and international markets. The objective of this study was to identify the physiological behavior of the seeds of yellow passion fruit, sweet passion fruit and purple passion fruit during storage for contribution to ex situ conservation. The experimental design was completely randomized with five treatments and three replications following the protocol of Hong and Ellis (1996). Firstly, the seeds were dried in chambers with a continuous air flow (22°C and 35% relative humidity [RH]), with a decrease in moisture content to the optimum range of 10-12%, for 5 hours for yellow passion fruit and purple passion fruit, obtaining 100% and 77.1% germination, respectively. In the case of sweet passion fruit, desiccation took 20 hours with 79.5% germination. Afterwards, decreasing the moisture content to 6% (21°C and 10% RH) took 60 hours for yellow passion fruit and purple passion fruit, with a germination of 81.2% and 98.6%, respectively, and 105 hours for sweet passion fruit, with 91.4% germination. According to the mentioned protocol, the treatments underwent conservation assessments for 6 months at the 1^st, 3^rd and 6^th month, with an average germination of 94.1% for yellow passion fruit, 90.9% for sweet passion fruit and 87.9% for purple passion fruit. This suggests that the seeds of the three species are tolerant to desiccation and possibly belong to the orthodox category. These results contribute to the management and conservation of plant genetic resources of Neotropical fruit.

Keywords : desiccation; fruit; germination; Neotropical; passion fruit; genetic resources.

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