The Fusarium vascular wilt occurs in several passion fruit producing regions and it has been caused hight plant mortality. Mutagenesis associated with in vitro selection using phytotoxins enables the application of a strong selection pressure on a large number of propagules and driving the selection of specific mutants. In this research, it was investigated the effect of gamma rays on the survival of yellow passion fruit plants inoculated with F. oxysporum f. sp. passiflorae. Shoots from stem segments of P. edulis irradiated at 20Gy were subjected to two cycles of selection in culture medium supplemented with a fungal culture filtrate (40% and 50% of filtrate). The selected plants were inoculated with conidia suspension in greenhouse and then transferred to field with a serious incidence of Fusarium wilt. At the end of the in vitro selection stage no control plants and 17.05% of irradiated plants survived. The suspension conidia inoculation resulted in no significant differences in survival for irradiated and non-irradiated plants. However, under field conditions radiation positively affect the plant survival. Of the irradiated plants 77.78% survived and all control plants died.
mutation induction; Fusarium wilt; tissue culture; P. edulis f. flavicarpa
