Terry, AshPark, SunghunMotolai, GergelyStuart, Nathan2022-11-092022-11-092022-07-28https://hdl.handle.net/2097/42821Hemp, Cannabis sativa, is a plant valued for its medicinal properties, fiber, and oil. While the hemp industry has grown significantly in the past years, a protocol for its tissue culture has not been publicly established. Tissue culture allows for regeneration of plants in a controlled, sterile environment while utilizing less space. Since creating a sterile environment is critical to a successful tissue culture, this study focused on the effects of different sterilization methods on contamination and germination of hemp seeds. The different sterilization rinses tested were water (control), 5% hydrogen peroxide, 70% ethanol, 20% bleach, 30% bleach, 40% bleach, and 50% bleach solutions. One of these solutions was applied to a group of hemp seeds. Within each group one third was rinsed in the solution for 5 minutes, another third for 10 minutes, and the last third for 15 minutes. The seeds were then placed onto germination media and left to germinate in a growth chamber for one week. The 20% bleach rinse for 10 minutes generated the lowest contamination rate, 4.5%, while maintaining the highest germination rate, 77.3%. Excluding the control, the 70% ethanol rinses for 5 and 10 minutes had two of the highest contamination rates and the two lowest germination rates. These results provide preliminary information about sterilization of hemp seeds for tissue culture. Once a reliable hemp tissue culture protocol is fully developed it will provide hemp growers with a dependable method to produce quality, disease free hemp.This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).https://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/hempCannabis sativaseed surface sterilizationtissue culturegerminationText