Gayana Bot. 74(1),74(1): 2017X-X, 2017 ISSN 0016-5301 Original Article Asymbiotic germination in three Chloraea species (Orchidaceae) from Chile Germinación asimbiótica en tres especies de Chloraea (Orchidaceae) de Chile GUILLERMO PEREIRA1, VERÓNICA ALBORNOZ1, CHRISTIAN ROMERO1, SEBASTIÁN LARA3 MANUEL SÁNCHEZ- OLATE2, DARCY RÍOS2 & CRISTIAN ATALA3* 1Laboratorio Biotecnología de Hongos, Campus Los Ángeles, Universidad de Concepción, Casilla 234, Los Ángeles, Chile. 2Laboratorio Cultivo de Tejidos Vegetales, Facultad de Ciencias Forestales, Universidad de Concepción, Casilla 160-C, Concepción, Chile. 3Laboratorio de Anatomía y Ecología de Plantas. Instituto de Biología, Facultad de Ciencias, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, Campus Curauma, Avenida Universidad 330, Valparaíso, Chile. *
[email protected] ABSTRACT Orchids require symbiotic fungi and/or specific conditions to germinate. Asymbiotic techniques have been shown successful for orchid germination. In Chile, Chloraea include many endemic, and potentially ornamental, terrestrial orchid species. In this study, individuals of Chloraea crispa, C. gavilu and C. virescens were manually autopollinated. The resulting capsules were sterilized and seeds were aseptically obtained. We evaluated asymbiotic germination in: Agar Water (AW), Knudson C (KC), Banana Culture Media (CMB), Tomato Culture Media (CMT), Malmgren Modified (MM), Murashige and Skoog (MS), and MS modified (MS1/2). Seeds were incubated in the dark at 24±1 ºC for 2 weeks. Then they were put in 16/8 h light/dark cycles for 14 weeks. We registered germination and embryo development in the different culture media. After 8 weeks, all tested Chloraea species germinated in most culture media. After 16 weeks, embryos in MM showed an evident shoot. In AW only the pre-germination stage was achieved.