The effect of homoeopathic potencies of abscisic acid on the production of a-amylase in barley seeds (Hordeum vulgare) in the presence of gibberellic acid

Abstract

This study investigated the effect of different homoeopathic potencies of abscisic acid (ABA) in the presence of gibberellic acid (GA3) on the production of a.-amylase in the de-embryonated endosperm half-seeds of barley (Hordeum vulgare) in order to investigate whether these potencies were able to produce a biological effect. The aleurone layer of the barley (Hordeum vulgare) grain secretes hydrolases that mobilise endosperm reserves during germination. The synthesis and secretion of these hydrolases (principally a.-amylase) is under hormonal regulation. Gibberellic acid (GA) stimulates the synthesis and secretion of a.-amylase and abscisic acid (ABA) reverses this effect. It is for this reason that barley aleurone has been used extensively as a model system for the study of signal transduction in response to GA and ABA (Ritchie, McCubbin, Ambrose, Kao and Gilroy, 1999). For this research five different homoeopathic potencies were used namely - the 4CH, 9CH, 15CH, 30CH and the 200CH. Two methods were used in this experiment namely - spectrophotometry and radial diffusion. For each method three replications were used. Each replication consisted of: five groups of 20 half-seeds treated with the various potencies (the 4CH, 9CH, 15CH, 30CH and the 200CH) of ABA, with a dilution at GA3 at 1x 10.g;five groups of 20 half-seeds treated with the of GA3 at 1X 10.9 (the control) and five groups of 20 half-seeds treated with only the incubation buffer (calcium nitrate). An a.-amylase curve was constructed for both methods using pure a.-amylase at 1350 enzyme units /mg