Regulation of Potato Tuber Dormancy
Bizuayehu Desta *
Department of Horticulture, College of Agriculture and Natural Resource Sciences, Debre Berhan University, P.O. Box 445, Debre Berhan, Ethiopia.
Netsanet Tena
Department of Plant Sciences, College of Agriculture and Natural Resource Sciences, Debre Berhan University, P.O. Box 445, Debre Berhan, Ethiopia.
Getachew Amare
Department of Horticulture, College of Agriculture and Natural Resource Sciences, Debre Berhan University, P.O. Box 445, Debre Berhan, Ethiopia.
*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Abstract
Potato tuber dormancy is the last phase of tuber existence helping to maintain tubers as organs of vegetative reproduction under non-favorable growth environments. Tubers of potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) are dormant and will not sprout. As the time of postharvest storage is prolonged, dormancy of tuber is broken and sprout growth commences. Dormancy breaking and beginning of sprout growth of potato tuber is complemented by several biochemical changes, most of which are critical to the nutritional and processing qualities of potatoes. Environmental, physiological and hormonal control mechanisms have been proposed to play a significant role in tuber dormancy regulation. In this review, the environmental and endogenous factors responsible for tuberization have been reviewed and discussed. Furthermore, numerous biochemical and physiological processes principal to enhanced tuberization under the influence of environmental and endogenous factors are discussed in detail.
Keywords: Assimilate, dormancy, hormone, potato, tuberization