Published in Scientific Papers. Series "Management, Economic Engineering in Agriculture and rural development", Vol. 23 ISSUE 3
Written by Elena BONCIU

Many of the higher plants can be genetic models for the detection of environmental mutagens. One of the species often used in monitoring environmental pollution with pesticides is onion (Alium cepa). The Allium assay (Aa) is used with a high frequency in many studies to evaluate the cytotoxic and genotoxicity effects of various chemical substances in agricultural plants. This is based on the fact that compared to using animals for testing the Aa is more cost-effective and provides a large amount of data using a simple cultivation protocol without ethical concerns. In this context, the purpose of this study was to evaluate the clastogenic potential of two pesticides (Rancona fungicide and Mospilan insecticide) in plants through the Allium assay, using onion meristematic roots as biological material. The meristematic roots were exposed for 24 h to three different concentrations of pesticides as follows: 0.5, 1, and 2 μg/mL (Rancona) and 0.05, 0.1, 0.2 μg/mL (Mospilan). The obtained results showed that the tested pesticides induced the decrease, in variable percentages, of the mitotic index (MI %) in the onion meristematic cells, in all tested variants. Thus, compared to the control variant, the values of MI in the variants exposed to the pesticide treatment were between 38-54% (Rancona), respectively 30-48% in the variants treated with Mospilan. At the same time, there was a direct correlation between the pesticides concentration and the clastogenic effect observed in onion cells, through the appearance of several types of chromosomal and nuclear aberrations: sticky, fragments, bridges and chromosomal loss; nuclear dissolution and ring chromosomes. These results suggest caution when using the tested pesticides and mandatory compliance with the concentrations recommended by the producers, to avoid negative impact on plants and environment.

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