Genetic improvement of Egyptian henbane, Hyoscyamus muticus L. through induced tetraploidy.

Induced autotetraploids with high pollen and seed fertility have been developed in a medicinally important Solanaceous plant: Hyoscyamus muticus (2n=28). The colchiploids are vigorous and the increase in all the determinate parts - plant height, size and thickness of leaves, cell, pollen, seed and flower size - along with an increase in alkaloid content has been achieved. The overall improvement in the colchiploids has the advantage of enhancing nearly 1.5 times the production potential of the economic product - the total alkaloids. Although the seed is not the ultimate economic product in this species, it is still required for propagation. The seed fertility in the colchiploids improved because of reduction in quadrivalent frequency and subsequent balanced anaphase separation.