Study on leaf characters and chlorophyll content of tetraploid Chinese jujube 'Chenguang'

Polyploidy is considered to be the main driving force for plant evolution and an important mechanism for adapting to environmental changes. The autotetraploid plant displayed distinct morphological characteristics compared with the diploid plant. The autotetraploid Chinese jujube, ‘Chenguang’, was successfully induced from diploid ‘Linyilizao’ by employing colchicine as mutagen. Up to now, systematic comparative study on leaf characteristics and chlorophyll content has not been well done. In this Study, leaf characters and chlorophyll content of ‘Chenguang’ were systemically investigated in relation to its diploid counterpart ‘Linyilizao’ for the first time. Compared with ‘Linyilizao’, ‘Chenguang’ showed dark green, oval, margin obtuse teeth and thicker leaf. The width and length of the ‘Chenguang’ stomata were 41.46% and 40.43% larger, respectively. However, stomata density of ‘Chenguang’ was significantly reduced by 29.76%. The chlorophyll a, chlorophyll b and total chlorophyll of the leaves of ‘Chenguang’ were increased by 16, 22.86 and 48% compared with those of ‘Linyilizao’ respectively. Those results provide scientific basis for the quality evaluation and photosynthetic mechanism of tetraploid in Chinese jujube.