Tissue Culture | Benefits of Plant Tissue culture ,Process of Plant tissue culture, and Types of Plant tissue culture

Tissue culture

Tissue culture is a technique in which plant material is grown artificially controlled environment. There are several benefits of plant tissue culture with few drawbacks. The article will explain the process of plant tissue culture so you can know how to perform tissue culture in the laboratory. Various types of plant tissue culture are also discussed in the article.

Tissue culture

Tissue culture is a technique in which plant material is grown in an artificially controlled environment. Segments of tissue are used as a medium and developed in a particular media to produce complete plant tissue.

In the tissue culture technique, a plant cell can divide infinitely and differentiate into other types of plant cells under controlled environment conditions. In this technique, plant growth is governed by two characteristics of cells, totipotency, and flexibility. In the case of totipotent, plant tissue is reproduced and developed into the whole plant. Under in vitro circumstances, a plant cell can change its metabolic rate and development.

Fragments of plant tissue are known as explants such as the root. callus, leaf, stem cells, embryo culture, meristem, seed, etc. are grown in the laboratory and cultured using agar and broth media. In other words, this technique is also known as micropropagation.

Benefits of Plant tissue culture

Plants with desired traits can be created by altering their genetic makeup. Pant tissues undergo the process of regeneration through the tissue culture technique and produce similar copies of themselves. The following are the benefits of tissue culture:

1. It aids in increasing crop yield and enhancing food production.
2. A relatively minute amount of plant tissue is required to initiate the process for the first time and the process could be completed in a short interval of time.
3. The plants which are produced are disease-free and virus-free plantlets.
4. The procedure requires less space and could be performed in any season. It’s not a seasonal technique.
5. On a commercial scale, this method aids in producing a novel variety of subspecies. Ornamental and complex plants can be grown by this method as compared to traditional methods.

Drawbacks of  Tissue Culture

Tissue culture is an expensive technique and requires a lot of work to do.

The pant produced through tissue culture has a chance to be less resistant to diseases due to the conditions which are provided for the growth are not much favorable.

If the plant material is not screened before culturing then the new plant would become infectious.

The probability of results of this method is less. If the right steps are performed, there is still a chance that a chemical reaction will take place which damages the explant.

Process of  Plant tissue Culture

The process of tissue culture is performed in laboratories to regenerate a complete plant through small segments of plant cells.

Preparation of Sterilized Culture

The seedlings are prepared for culturing at this step. Before inoculating in a growth medium, explants are first prepared and chemically sterilized. The explant is disinfected with an anti-microbial agent and kept in a media that contains nutrients, growth regulators, vitamins, and carbohydrates. The culture media is inoculated at room temperature either in a dark or constant sunlight environment.

Initiation Process

After incubating for several weeks callus is formed. The terminal part of plant tissue is known as the callus.  A callus is removed and placed on sterilized media that contains artificial nutrients under controlled environmental conditions. The callus is transferred to a new medium known as the multiplication medium.

Multiplication Process

The sterilized ex-plant is introduced to a medium that provides nutrients and growth regulators. This results in a plant cell dividing. Sub-culturing is necessary to preserve callus or tissue because, with the passage of time, some nutrients in the culture medium get depleted.  

Root Formation

 A callus is placed in suspension culture which is nutrient-rich and is provided with growth hormones known as auxins. The callus transferred to agar gel media grows and proliferates root formation.

Shoot Formation

The roots are separated out before placing in a new medium and are provided with plant growth hormones known as cytokinins which encourage shoot formation.

Plantlets are acclimatized and transferred to the soil

The callus separates into small plantlets which have both roots and shoots. This technique develops plantlets through a tiny amount of plant tissue. In vitro, plants are susceptible to disease and pathogen attack. The plantlets are hardened to prevent them from stress, humidity, and other infections, and then transferred to the open field or soil, so they could develop into a mature plant.

Process of Plant tissue culture

Types of Plant tissue culture

There are many types of plant tissue culture but the most commonly used in tissue culture techniques are:

Seed Culturing

An embryo is removed from a living cell and developed in in-vitro conditions. Seeds that do not germinate are immature seeds and seeds which through germination produce ripe seeds are mature seeds.

Callus Culturing

A callus is an undifferentiated cell mass. Any section of plant material can be taken for callus culture and grown under in vitro conditions. The callus culture is produced when the plant tissue is grown in appropriate agar media.

Organ Culturing

Any plant organ such as root, leaf, or stem, may be used as an explant to maintain its structure and capabilities. Several techniques can be utilized for organ culture including agar, gel, raft, plasma clot, and grid techniques.

Pollen Culturing

The anther is present in the pollen region of the male reproductive flower. These pollens represent the desired trait and gene of interest. During culturing, pollens are placed in a sterilized agar media to create a whole plant through the tissue culture technique. 

Plant Protoplast Culturing

Plant protoplasts are cells that do not have a cell wall. In this technique, the plant cell wall is destroyed mechanically or enzymatically. The cell wall is then disinfected with chemicals, and placed in an appropriate media under controlled conditions where it develops into a complete pant. Different stages can be seen during protoplast culturing including cell wall formation, cell division, and pant rejuvenation.

Embryonic Culturing

Gymnosperm and angiosperm shoot apical meristem are cultivated to develop into a whole plant that would be free of diseases. In this technique, mature and premature embryos are grown in an artificial medium which will result in the development of roots and shoot of the plant.