QUESTIONS: COLCHICINE ! and polyploidy

[NdefusableChrnc]

willl colchicine treated f1 seeds (which have survived and lead to tetraploids during flower) have clones with the same genetic affects ?

will the 4n polyploidy be dominant and inherited to the seeds ?

is it possible to treat the f1/f2 seeds with colchicine again for better results ?

generally, do the larger the size of seeds lead to better results ?

are top end strains today originating from colchicine treated p1 seed parents ? ( the ones that survive at a low % rate anyway)

 

[Guest]

If you alter a plants DNA with colchicine the plants DNA can not be repaired.Most plants altered with colchicine will be sterile. larger seeds do not translate to better pot plants.DO not under any circumstances smoke pot treated with colchicine. Colchicine poisoning is similar to lead poisoning.That buzz will last a life time.

 

[NdefusableChrnc]

i meant seeds treated with colchicine

 

[CMatzner]

If you're lucky, colchicine treated seeds will result in polyploidy in some cells of the plant. To get a totally polyploid plant, you will have to get S1s (or F1 if you plan on treating more than one plant). The problem is that it's a shoot and miss, and there's no immediate way of finding out if a plant is polyploidy. One unreliable indication is that it becomes a very large plant (not vigorous growth per se, but the max size of leaves are larger). Another good indication is that the plant is able to self itself and these progeny will be viable. When bred with a diploid, the offsprings of these will be viable F2 triploids, but these triploids will be sterile even with other triploids. This will take a tremendous amount of time, space and effort. The best way is to treat isolated cell cultures with colchicine, grow them up and use a cytometer (they cost hundreds of dollars to access) to determine their karyotype.

I would forgo trying to make a polyploidy plant, it's a long and difficult task even for a scientist. You might succeed in making one, but finding out which one it is out of a 1000 progeny is a daunting task. As far as I know, there is no commercial polyploidy strain out there.

For some reason, a lot of people think that three cotyledons means triploidy, but that's false.

 

[INDIANA JONES]

s1 excuse me. i only have one half o my mind

 

[carpetmunch]

colchicine is a natural product that is used as a drug to treat gouty symptoms.
The main side effects are nausea and vomiting, which occur when too much is consumed. The effects are not like lead poisoning and if side effects occur they do not last a life time. It is funny tho, cause i see this repeated often when this subject comes up.

When using this drug to induce polyploidy in plants numerous methods can be employed. One can soak seeds in a dilute solution of water and cholchicine or one can cut a v shaped knot in a growing tip of the plant and drop a small
amount of solution into the "v". If the tip recovers subsequent growth might be polyploid.

Plants grown from treated seeds should be fine to consume, because the amounts of the drug are so incredibily small to begin with and become diluted with plant growth and degraded by plant metabolism, curing and drying of buds.

I have some experience with inducing polyploidy in daylilies. The plants grow with more vigor, larger leaves and flowers and are fertile when crossed with other tetraploids.

So I say go for it!

Carpetmunch

 

[Guest]

If u are going to bother with cell culture and regeneration I would advise to channel ur efforts into generating haploids from anthers/microspores. Then u could treat those with colchicine for the production of homozygous doubled haploids which can be used in hybrid selection. U'll need a bunch of lab-gear like the flow cytometer, media/glassware/hormones, laminar flowhood and culture rooms...
Goodluck with regenerating cannabis from cellcultures, seems like they are easy to root but can be a pain to direct into developing shoots. Keep us posted, for sure this would be a very nice project!

Cheers,

 

[pHrail]

Hope to see more on this subject, great thread!

 

[GOSH]

Hope to see more on this subject, great thread!

yeah, reall interesting!

 

[pHrail]

I know they touch on this in "Marijuana Botany" but it seems like the results are kind of inconclusive. I think there is going to be A LOT we learn from this wonderful plant in the next 10 years. Personally I think why they keep marijuana illegal is because the gov already knows what the plant holds. By them keeping it illegal they can monopolize on the research and create wonder drugs before anyone. It may hold the cure to cancer and god forbid pot being legal that means people would live longer and the gov wouldn't want the population to get out of control. More research would be done and more mysteries of cannabis would be unlocked and I think there would be some truly magical findings. I think that is what the gov is truly afraid of. It would put a dent in pharmaceutical companies big time.

 

[Verite]

I think a bunch of breeders messed with this in the 90's and the results were far from great. Unless you call excessive uncontrollable mutations great. If you think youre going to end up with ideal looking plants that just happen to have extra branches at the nodes youre in for a majority of surprizes.

Youre going to get more gnarled growth, variegated growth patterns, stem split-offs, dual crowning of the growth tip, fasciated stems, self-terminating branches and stems, etc than you'll get nice symetrical additions of branches. Plants do some real strange things when you go adding multiple copies of chromosomes to their genetic code.

And I dont care what people tell you, the levels of colchicine you need to effect seeds is so f-in toxic its insane. Then consider the product is fully absorbable thru your skin increases the chances of exposure. While you may survive taking too many gout pills its for certain you will not survive even small exposures to concentrated colchicine.

 

[carpetmunch]

have seen colchicine work to create tetraploid daylilies which then given time and depending on method
used (placed on growing tips or adding it to sprouting seeds) results in seemingly normal plants which grow well and reproduce without problems with other tetraploids. Mj is a different plant for sure, but I do not think it is unrealistic to think good results could be had if one tried increasing its ploidy by using colchicine. Colchicine is a natural product which is a basic (charged) molecule at physologic ph (7.4). Charged molecules do not cross lipid barriers (like skin) very well unless there is active transport thru the cell membrane or a carrier solvent such as DMSO.

Some people do not like colchicine and do not think it is ok to play with. That's cool, I respect that.
However, I think we should understand that the toxicity of colchicine in humans is understood well enough to state small doses would have minimal effects. It is even used as a longterm daily medicine as a preventive
treatment for patients with gout. "to relieve a gout attack is 1 to 1.2 mg (two 0.5 mg or two 0.6 mg tablets). This dose may be followed by one unit of either strength tablet every hour, or two units every two hours,
until pain is relieved or until diarrhea ensues." * source about. com
(however if you have a bad heart, liver or kidneys colchicine may not be right for you. Please consult
your Dr. )

If I had 1,000's of seeds (I don't) of a desirable cross I might try it. But now I am just trying to learn about growing and strains. That is a challenge enough.

PS I could not touch Verite with even a very long pole
much respect!

CM

 

[Verite]

Unfortunately you would be wrong.. deadly wrong. Your limited knowledge on the subject extends to the lengths of gout pills? The levels of colchicine needed to effect plant genetics is far from small and not even close to what your talking about in gout pills, its pure colchicine. Gout must suck if you need to take a poison to relieve it. Heres some wiki excerpts that beg to differ on dangers of colchicine and its toxicity.

Colchicine is a highly poisonous natural product and secondary metabolite, originally extracted from plants of the genus Colchicum (Autumn crocus, also known as the "Meadow saffron").

Colchicine inhibits microtubule polymerization by binding to tubulin, one of the main constituents of microtubules. Availability of tubulin is essential to mitosis, and therefore colchicine effectively functions as a "mitotic poison" or spindle poison. Since one of the defining characteristics of cancer cells is a significantly increased rate of mitosis, this means that cancer cells are significantly more vulnerable to colchicine poisoning than are normal cells. However, the therapeutic value of colchicine against cancer is (as is typical with chemotherapy agents) limited by its toxicity against normal cells.

Side effects include gastro-intestinal upset and neutropenia. High doses can also damage bone marrow and lead to anaemia. Note that all of these side effects can result from hyper-inhibition of mitosis.

Colchicine poisoning has been compared to arsenic poisoning: symptoms start 2 to 5 hours after the toxic dose has been ingested and include burning in the mouth and throat, fever, vomiting, diarrhea,abdominal pain and kidney failure. Death from respiratory failure can follow. There is no specific antidote for colchicine, although various treatments do exist.

As colchicine is so dangerous, it is worth noting that doubling of chromosome numbers can occur spontaneously in nature, and not infrequently.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colchicine

Then the crux of your arguement being since they use it to treat gout it must be ok regardless of what level of colchicine is flying around? The above wiki points out that colchicine has a " relatively low theraputic index " and heres how wiki defined that.

The therapeutic index (also known as therapeutic ratio), is a comparison of the amount of a therapeutic agent that causes the therapeutic effect to the amount that causes toxic effects.

Generally, a drug with a narrow therapeutic range (i.e. with little difference between toxic and therapeutic doses) may have its dosage adjusted according to measurements of the actual blood levels achieved in the person taking it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therapeutic_index

Still not convinced? Heres what another houseplant website has to say on it.

Colchicine Hazards

Sean Barry

Keywords: Genetics: colchicine.

(While Ivan Snyder’s experiments are exciting, we wish to ensure that the biohazards associated with colchicine are clearly understood by readers of Carnivorous Plant Newsletter. We invited Sean Barry, from the University of California, to comment on the compound--BAMR)

Colchicine is by far the most dangerous chemical that home-based cell culturists might encounter in their experiments. It is part of a disparate group of chemicals that are capable of altering genetic material, in this case by disrupting the mitotic spindle that aligns and "tracks" the chromosomes during cell division. Cell division is thus arrested, and the result is polyploidy, or multiple sets of chromosomes (>2) within a single cell. This is potentially desirable in plant genetic engineering, but extremely hazardous if it affects certain tissues in the user, particularly germ cells (sperm and ova) and the developing embryo. For this reason, colchicine is classed as a teratogen (a substance that causes birth defects) and may also be a potential carcinogen. Colchicine is also very toxic. A single oral dose of as little as 3.0 milligrams (that is 0.003 grams, or 0.0001 ounce) has caused death, and the rat LD50 (i.e. the dosage that is lethal to about 50% of an experimental group) is as little as 0.125 milligrams per kilogram of body weight (and is presumably comparably toxic to humans. The material is equally toxic when ingested, inhaled as powder, or absorbed through the skin. Potential users of colchicine should first be trained in proper storage, handling and personal protection measures, and they should observe state and local disposal regulations.

References: Mallinckrodt-Baker and Abbott Labs Material Safety Data Sheets for colchicine reagent and pharmaceutical preparations.

http://www.carnivorousplants.org/cpn/samples/Cult291ColchHaz.htm

Last but not least we'll have some inspirational words from John Travolta.

 

[carpetmunch]

I like the fact that you brought in documentation to support your argument.
I think all will agree that colchicine is a toxic poison. However people work with toxic materials safely every day. And that is my point:It can be done safely and easily using the correct precautions. Or if you think the risks are too high not done at all. I am not recommending anyone do this.
It can and at some point will be done considering all the other crazy stuff people do: I don't see what is to stop someone. (already been done with Skunk if you believe what you read--see link)

Would you be willing to grow and consume polyploid mj that someone else induced with chochicine? How would we know that it was polyploid or that it had been treated?

Please read this thread if anyone is interested in getting more info:
includes safety precautions and humor--reader beware!!


http://www.shroomery.org/forums/showflat.php/Number/4233548

thought it was an interesting read.


Kind regards,
CM

 

[Verite]

I think the reason you got it with both barrels is because it sounded like you were minimizing the toxic potential of colchicine. When a single oral dose of 3mg has caused death I would say it doesnt take much of this stuff to kill you.

The stuff has been around for years and used plenty and if it produced any worthy desireable effects in marijuana there would be plenty of evidence to back it up. And no I wouldnt consume any plant material, seeds included that was treated with colchicine just like they tell you. The only safe stuff to consume is the prodigy.