Cyto-morphological Study of Mango Malformation in India

With view to identify the causes of Malformation, Cyto-morphological studies were undertaken on malformation in relation to normal in two cultivars of (Mangifera indica L.) which is widely cultivated for its fruits. Malformation reduced the panicle length and its emergence as compared to normal; panicle length as well as number of flowers reached its optimum on 12 days in normal, while in malformed tissue, these two processes continued up to 33 days. Very high frequency of flowers emergence in malformed as compared to normal irrespective of the cultivars was also noted. The presence of high frequency of multicellular bulbous trichome in the malformed tissue of both the cultivars was probably noted for the first time. Further, meiotic cell division was found to be highly disturbed leading to many meiotic irregularities, such as, laggards, bridges, non orientation of spindles, cell cycle variations, variation in nucleolus number etc., in the malformed tissues. Meiotic abnormalities and presence of high frequency of multicellular bulbous trichome may be attributed to the reduction in growth of panicle as well as flowering pattern, resulting in poor fertility and fruit setting.