Inter relationships in some non tuberous species of Indian Solanum with special reference to the Alkaloid content and the origin of Brinjal

Abstract

The material for the present study includes 14 species of Solanum including 24 geographical races collected from different parts of India Of the 2000 species belonging to genus Solanum 1175 are confined to South America suggesting that this region of the new world is the centre of origin of the genus The Asian species are only 154 in number and are all non tuberous Of these 22 species are indigenous to India This study is confined to cytology morphology and alkaloid content of 14 species and 7 geographical races collected from the wild