An investigation on optimization of germination and ephedrine level in Ephedra major

Ephedra is a dioecious shrub belongs to the Ephedraceae family. Almost all commercial applications of Ephedra extracts is derived from the ephedrine alkaloids found in the evergreen stems. The purpose of this study was to investigate seed germination in green house condition and total alkaloid and ephedrine amounts measurement. The Ephedra seeds were collected from Bojnoord region and germinated on the wet paper and MS medium under control and cold treatment conditions. The results revealed that cold treatment did not show any significant effect on seed germination. To determine optimum condition for Ephedra seed germination, another experiment was performed in complete randomized design with 6 different medium culture (forest soil, Bojnoord soil, a mixture of forest and Bojnoord soil, coco peat, compost and sand) and 4 replicates. The obtained results showed that the maximum (90%) and minimum (8%) percent of seed germination was observed on forest soil and compost medium, respectively. Meanwhile the highest dry and fresh weight of shoot and root was obtained in plantlets that were grown on forest soil. On other hands, total alkaloid level in the stem organ plants that were grown on forest soil was 1/04 mg/g dry weight, but in root organ it was 0/04 mg/g dry weight. Data from HPLC analysis revealed that while root is depleted of ephedrine, the ephedrine amount in stem organ is 0.04 mg/g dry weight.