History of Plant Tissue Culture
History of Plant Tissue Culture
History of Plant Tissue Culture
The science of plant tissue culture takes its roots from the discovery of cell
proposed that cell is the basic structural unit of all living organisms. They
visualized that cell is capable of autonomy and therefore it should be possible for
premise, in 1902 a German physiologist Gottlieb Haberlandt for the first time
attempted to culture isolated single palisade cells from leaves in knops salt solution
enriched with sucrose. The cells reminded alive for up to one month, increased in
size, accumulated starch but failed to divide .Thought he was unsuccessful but laid
down the foundation of tissue culture technology for which he is regarded as the
In plant cell culture, plant tissue and organs are grown in vitro on artificial media,
under aseptic and controlled environment .The technique depends mainly on the
concept of tot potentiality of plant cells which refers to the ability of a single cell to
express the full genome by cell division. Along with the totipotent potential of
plant cell, the capacity of cells to alter their metabolism, growth and development
Murashige and skoog medium (MS medium) is most extensively used for the
vegetative propagation of many plant species in vitro. The ph of the media is also
important that affects both the growth of plants and activity of plant growth
regulators. It is adjusted to the value between 5.4 to 5.8. both the solid and liquid
medium can be used for culturing. The composition of the medium, particularly the
plant hormones and the nitrogen source has profound effects on the response of the
initial explants.
development pathways of plant cells and tissue in culture medium. The auxins,
cytokinins and gibberellins are most commonly used plant growth regulators. The
type and the concentration of hormones used depend mainly on the species of the
plants, the tissue or organ cultured and the objective of the experiment. Auxins and
cytokinins are most widely used plant growth regulators in plant tissue cultures and
high concentration of auxins generally favors root formations, where as the high
callus.
Cytokinins generally promote cell division and induce shoot formation and axillary
Shoot initiation and proliferation was found maximum, when the callus of black
0.5mg/I . Gibberellins are used for enhanced growth and to promote cell
conductive for their growth and multiplication. These condition include proper
temperature proper gaseous and liquid environment and proper supply of nutrients
.
Plant tissue culture relies on the facts that many plants cell have the ability to
regenerate the whole plants (Totpotency ) single cells , plant cell without cell walls
generate a new plants on culture media given the required nutrients and plant
much forestry, plantation and other difficult to root species can be clonally
reproduced, the high cost of tissue culture techniques has prevented broader
used to grow embryos from seeds and ovules in a nutrient medium. In embryo
culture, the plant develops directly from the embryo or indirectly thought the
formation of callus and then subsequent formation of shoots and roots. The
techniques has been developed to break seed dormancy, test the vitality of seeds,
by growing excised embryo and results in the reduction of long dormancy period
homozygous plants in relatively short time period through the protoplast, anther
The term androgensis refers to the production of haploid plants from young pollen
pollen grains as primary explants. The haploidy technology has now become an
lines and overcoming the constraints of seed dormancy and embryo no viability .
haploid plants with induced resistance to various biotic and a biotic stresses.
4) SOMATIC EMBRYOGENESIS AND ORGANOGENESIS – somatic
which somatic cells or tissues develop into differentiated embryos. These somatic
embryos can developed into whole plants without undergoing the process of sexual
multiplication of embryos. Mature embryos are then cultured for germination and
Somatic embryogenesis has been reported in many plants including trees and
some cactus species. These are various factors that affects the induction and
been reported for somatic embryogenesis on grapevine that showed higher plant
regeneration sufficiently when the tissue were cultured in liquid medium. Plant
Somatic embryogenesis is not only a process of regeneration the plants for mass
propagation but also regarded as a valuable tool for genetic manipulation. This
process can also be used to develop the plants that are resistant to various kinds of
has been developed for regeneration of cotton cultivars with resistance to Fusarium
5) ORGANOGENESIS -
It refers to the production of plant organs (i.e.) root, shoots and leaves that may
arise directly from the meristem or indirectly from the undifferentiated cell masses
(callus). Plant regeneration via organogenesis involves the callus production and
Skoog and Muller were the first who demonstrated that high ratio of cytokinin to
auxin stimulated the formation of shoots in tobacco callus while high auxin to
high rate of disappearance of plant species and the increased need for safeguarding
Tissue culture protocols can be used for preservation of vegetative tissue when the
targets for conservation are clones instead of seeds , to keep the genetic
background of a crop and to avoid the loss of the conserved patrimony due to
The plant species which do not produce seeds that can not be stored for long period
of time can successful be preserved via in vitro techniques for the maintenance of
gene banks.
genomes followed by the selection of desired somatic hybrid cells and regeneration
crop improvement.
Somatic hybrids were produced by fusion of protoplasts from rice and ditch reed
applicable in horticultural industry to create new hybrids with increased fruit yield
and better resistance to diseases. Successful viable hybrid plants were obtained
aspect of plant cell and tissue culture that provides the mean of transfer of gene
with desirable traits in to host plants and recovery of transgenic plants. The
vector less methods. Among vector dependant gene transfer methods Agro
bacterium mediated genetic transformation is most widely used for the expression
of foreign gene in plant cells .successful introduction of organic traits in plants was
achieved by using root explants for the genetic transformation recently successful
transgenic plants of jatrpha were obtained by direct DNA delivery to mature seed
derived shoot apices via particle bombardment methods. This technology has an
important impact on the reduction of the toxic substances in seeds thus overcoming
Cell suspension culture systems are used now days for large scale culturing of
Cell culture can not only yield defined standared phytochemicals in large volumes
but also eliminate the presence of interfering compounds that occurs in the field
grown plants. The advantage of this methods is that it can ultimately provide a
continuous, reliable source of natural products. A major advantage of the cell
controlled environment , independently from climate and soil conditions. The first
commercial application of large scale cultivation of plant cells were carried out
stirred tank reactors of 200 liter and 750 liter capacities to produce shikonin by cell
proteins and food additives re produced in various cultures of plants cell and
tissues. Advances in the area of cell cultures for the production of medicinal
acids . some of these are now available commercially in the market for examples
shikonin and poclitaxel . until now 20 different recombinant proteins have been
never been seen before. As we enter the new millennium, one key development
that comes to our mind is the emergence of biotechnology, which offers some of
the best opportunities and solutions to some of the uncontrollable problems faced
by us.
common;theymanipulate living cells and their molecules and have a wide range of
usesthat can improve our lives. The major techniques of biotechnology are genetic
forproducing a cell into a full-fledged plant. These ready plantlets are then
This technique of plant propagation greatly reduces the labour and space
requirement, for producing new varieties and can also markedly enhance
trees are in progress. Several scientists have been experimenting to extend the
For example experiments on crops like coconut, date palm. Cashew, Mango,
Orange etc. are being made in the different research laboratories. With the advent
forest, and fruit trees by tiny plantlets. Commercialization of these crops has
Anthurium etc. has been commercially grown. In Fruit crops, Banana, Sugarcane
etc. has been commercially grown. In Forest trees. Teak, Eucalyptus etc. has been
commercial plantation.
application (see Thorpe, 1990, 2007 and Stasolla & Thorpe 2011). Although Street
(1977) has recommended a more restricted use of the term, plant tissue culture is
generally used for the aseptic culture of cells, tissues, organs, and their components
Perhaps the earliest step toward plant tissue culture was made by Henri-Louis
This theory holds that the cell is the unit of structure and function in an organism
and therefore capable of autonomy. This idea was tested by several researchers, but
the work of Vochting (1878) on callus formation and on the limits to divisibility of
He showed that the upper part of a stem segment always produced buds and the
lower end callus orroots independent of the size until a very thin segment was