The effects of ultra-high diluted giberelic acid on in vitro lettuce seed germination.
INTRODUCTION
Laboratory bioassays have been allowed researchers to eliminate possible interferences through
perfectly controlled experimental designs and manipulation of nearly all parameters. So,
investigators can manipulate complex conditions one at a time to search for answers to a while
kind of scientific questions (Mancías et al., 2000)
Lettuce seeds bioassays have been used for testing many different things like allelopathic
responses, discovering of new drugs and toxicity tests, for instance (Mancías et al., 2000). This
bioassay has been recommended by some Governmental Agencies as U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development, because it has proven to be an easy and inexpensive mean of
testing the toxicity of different types of contaminants of concern in water and sediments,
including heavy metals and some pesticides and other organic toxicants.
In most cases, lettuce (Lactuca sativa L., Asteraceae) has been used because of its sensitivity,
simultaneous and fast germination, reliability of germination percentage and homogeneity of
seeds. Others advantages are they are less expensive and easy to culture, when compared with
other organism usually used, and require no upkeep between experiments. It’s used extensively
and allows comparison of bioassays from many different compounds.
Considering homeopathy research, according to Majewsky et al., (2009) and Jäger et al., (2015),
the main plant used in plant models in general is wheat followed by Dwarf peas and duckweed.
Lettuce had been used in very few experiments regarding impaired adult plants and seedlings
(Bonfim et al., 2011) and, specifically to experiments using healthy plants, almost none papers
reporting the use of lettuce seeds were found (Hopkins, 1998), although seedling model is the
most frequently experimental plant model used on basic research in homeopathy (Majewsky et
al., 2009).