The use of in vitro culture can enhance the productivity of cassava cultivars infected by viral diseases by ensuring high quality and quantity of cassava planting. Then, due to the difficulty and cost implication of obtaining healthy cuttings from certified sources, most farmers often rely on uncertified cuttings, increasing the risk of viral infection. This study
aimed to use thermotherapy to improve successful of meristem culture of two cassava cultivars: BFM206 and BFM260. To address this, two treatments were studied. First, the cuttings of this cultivars subjected heat treatment (HT) in a thermotherapy chamber, starting at 37 °C and increasing by 2 °C weekly over four weeks, reaching up to 43 °C. The chamber’s light intensity was 2000 lx with a photoperiod of 16 h of light and 8 h of darkness and a relative humidity ranged from 70 to 90%. Second, control cuttings were maintained under field conditions for four months. Post-treatment, the resulting shoots served as mother plants for meristem culture. The experimental design was a split-plot with five repetitions. The main parameters studied included the meristem regeneration rate (MRR), callus formation rate, the numbers of nodes, stems, leaves and roots. Results indicated that under HT, the BFM260 cultivar exhibited a significantly higher MRR (60.90 ± 12.58%) compared to the BFM206 cultivar (34.50 ± 10.93%) (P = 0.008). Additionally, the BFM260 cultivar developed more nodes (5.92 ± 2.36) (P = 0.002) and stems (2.62 ± 0.60) (P = 0.05) per meristem under HT than control treatment. Thermotherapy can be useful to improve the performances of meristem culture of the BFM260 cultivar.

Manihot esculenta, Thermotherapy, Meristem, Regeneration, Growth