Amomum tsaoko Seed Germination Study

The freshly mature seeds of Amomum tsaoko were collected from 10-year-old plants from a plantation in Napo County, Guangxi province, China (101 N, 113E). After mixing with moist perlite (volume ratio 1:3), seeds were stored in temperature-controlled incubators at 15 ℃ as a warm stratification [2 ]. To test seed germination, perlite was used as medium and the incubator was set to 20/30 ℃ (night/day) with a 12 h light/12 h dark cycle as reported in our previous study [2 ]. Germination capacity was recorded after 28 days of the experiment and the seed germination rate was calculated as the ratio of the number of seeds with the radicle protruding from the seed coat to the total number of seeds tested. There were three replicates per treatment with 100 seeds per germination box. Seeds were collected for transcriptome and proteome analysis after warm stratification of 30d (S30, early seed dormancy release period), 60d (S60, middle seed dormancy release period) and 90d (S90, late seed dormancy release period), respectively. The fresh seeds without stratification treatment were considered as the control (CK). Embryos were stripped with sterilized blades, frozen in liquid nitrogen immediately and stored at -80 ℃.