| dc.description.abstract | Ceylon gooseberry (Dovyalis hebecarpa or Ketambilla) is an under-utilized fruit crop in Sri
Lanka. It produces a deep purple berry, that is rich in antioxidants, pigments and vitamins
serving numerous medicinal and commercial applications. Plant electrophysiology is
the study of electrochemical phenomena of plant tissues in response to stimuli. This
study aimed to investigate how the electrophysiology of three versions of Ketambilla, bud,
seed and cuttings plants, changed upon application of moisture as an external stimulus.
The plant electrophysiology data was obtained throughout the study as in vivo potential
variations versus time through a non-destructive method. Platinum microelectrodes were
inserted into the plant stem as working and reference microelectrodes and the data was
recorded using a Potentiostat/Galvanostat. Potential versus time and overlay plots were
constructed. The data was analysed by calculating the Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) and
SNR (dB) values. The results showed that all the experiments produced peaks, where the
SNR (dB) value was above 0 dB, indicating that signal level was greater than noise level.
The experiments conducted on bud plants with 20 ml of moisture, cuttings plants with
both 10 ml and 20 ml of moisture, showed a notable change in the working electrode
potential upon addition of stimuli. Overall, Ketambilla bud plants gave the best response
with the highest SNR (dB) as 1.184 (SNR 15.274) at 20 ml of moisture stimulus. The
findings on the dependence of plant electrophysiology upon an external stimulus, can be
utilized to understand the stress response of the plant better. | |
