Abstract:
Tissue culture techniques are commonly used in plants as an efficient way to
propagate and store valuable genotypes. Often, some of the regenerants differ
from the parental type, a phenomenon called somaclonal variability. Assessment of
nutritional value variability in crops that may arise from somaclonal variability
during tissue culture propagation may have a strong impact on plant breeding,
conservation of genetic resources and nutrition in the areas of use. It is particularly
useful in the characterization of individual cultivars, and in determining
duplications in germplasm collections and for selecting parents. The Sorghum
bicolor (L) Moench tissue culture (TC) regenerants (Seredo, Mtama 1 and El
Gardam) were developed at the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and
Technology towards improvement for water stress tolerance for improved food
production in the ASALs in Kenya.
The study was conducted to evaluate the nutritional value of the parents and TC
regenerants of Sorghum bicolor (L) Moench local cultivars (Seredo, Mtama 1 and El
Gardam) in Kenya. For proximate composition significant (p≤0.05) differences were
observed in parents and regenerants of the El‐Gardam (moisture, proteins and
crude fiber), Mtama 1 (proteins) and Seredo (fats and crude fiber). The mineral
compositions of the parents and regenerants of the cultivars were not significantly
different (p ≤ 0.05) except for Zinc in Mtama 1 cultivar and Iron in both El‐Gardam
and Mtama 1 cultivars. B‐vitamins showed significant differences (p ≤ 0.05) for
both thiamine and Pyridoxine in El‐Gardam and Seredo. Significant variability (p ≤
0.05) was shown phytates content in each cultivar. The parents were observed to
have significantly higher amounts of Phytates than the regenerants within all the
cultivars. The study recommends Mtama 1 regenerants with low anti‐nutrient
appropriate for ASALs with respect to nutrient availability since anti‐nutrients in
sorghum have been shown to impair the bioavailability of the other nutrients to
the body.
