Mutations and the Ageing of Seeds

Abstract

M. NAVASHIN¹ and his co-workers reported in a series of papers that plants produced from old seeds in Crepis show a great percentage of mutations. Similar observations were reported by Cartledge and Blakeslee² and by Peto³ in America working with various plants. They confirmed the results found by Navashin and his co-workers. All these authors state that Navashin made this discovery. Hugo de Vries, however, in his “Mutationstheorie” (1901)⁴, reported that in one case five-year old seeds from Oenothera gave 40 per cent instead of 5 per cent mutations (p. 185). He interpreted this phenomenon by postulating a longer viability of the mutated seeds (p. 186).