Investigating the effects of salicylic acid and methyl jasmonate on the morphological and biochemical traits of Matricaria chamomilla L. under in vitro conditions

The beneficial effects of the chamomile plant have been attributed to its essential oil, so any factor that affects the quantity of its essential oil will be of interest to researchers. To investigate the effect of plant growth regulators salicylic acid and methyl jasmonate on the production of secondary metabolites in chamomile plants, this experiment was conducted under the native in vitro conditions of Sharbian City. To conduct this research, chamomile seeds were collected from Sharbian (N ʺ52 58 37 and E ʺ06 ʹ11 ˚), East Azerbaijan province. After transfer, the seeds were sterilized for 15 minutes in a detergent. Their surfaces were disinfected with 70% alcohol for 45 seconds and then with sodium hypochlorite for 30 minutes. After surface disinfection, they were washed twice with distilled water. The basic culture medium in this study was the MS culture medium. All cultures were placed in the growth chamber at a temperature of 24±2°C and 16 hours of light and 8 hours of darkness. A factorial experiment was performed in a complete random design with three replications. Test treatments included salicylic acid (SA) and methyl jasmonate (MeJA) at five levels (0, 50, 100, 200, 400 μM). Minguez-Mosquera and Perez-Galvez methods were applied to determine photosynthetic pigment amounts. The amount of phenolic compounds in the plant extract was measured with a slight modification based on the Slinkard and Singleton method with the Folin-Ciocalteau reagent. The data related to this research were analyzed using SAS V.9.g.1 statistical software. The comparison of treatment averages was done with Duncan's test at 5% and 1%. Graphs were drawn using Microsoft Excel software. The analysis of variance showed that the interaction effect of the applied treatments on the traits of stem weight, root weight, stem length, and root length is significant at the 1% probability level. In addition, it is significant on the number of stems at the 5% probability level. The comparison of the averages showed that the highest amount of stem weight was obtained in the interaction effect of (50 µM) SA and (200 µM) MeJA, and the lowest amount of stem weight was obtained in the interaction effect of (400 µM) SA and (400 µM) MeJA treatment. The comparison of the means shows a significant difference in this trait. The highest amount of root weight was obtained in the interaction effect of (100 µM) SA and (100 µM) MeJA, and the lowest amount of root weight was obtained in the interaction of (400 µM) SA and (400 µM) MeJA treatment. Came. A comparison of the averages showed that the highest number of stems was obtained in the interaction of (100 µM) SA and (50 µM) MeJA, and the lowest number of stems was obtained in the interaction of (400 µM) SA and (200 µM) MeJA. The comparison of the means showed the significance of the stem and root length traits. The highest value of these two traits was due to the interaction of (50 µM) SA and (100 µM) MeJA treatments, and the lowest value of stem length was in the combination of (400 µM) SA and (µM) treatments. 400) MeJA and root length were measured from the combination of SA (400 µM) and MeJA (200 µM) treatments. In the biochemical traits, variance analysis of the data showed that the effect of SA levels on the amount of chlorophyll a, b, carotenoid, total chlorophyll, phenol, and flavonoid in all three wavelengths was significant at the 1% probability level. In this experiment, it was shown that metabolite production depends not only on enzyme activity but also on stimulant concentration. Increasing the stimulus more than usual not only increases metabolism but also reduces or stops the production of metabolites through the reduction of enzyme activity (probably through the reduction of the corresponding gene expression).