BIOTECHNOLOGY - Inshyna N.M. - 2009

CHAPTER 3. CELL ENGINEERING

Main Directions of Plant Cell Engineering

There are 3 primary directions in developing new technologies based on PLANT Cell AND tissue culture:

1) industrial production of valuable biologically active compounds of plant origin (toxins, growth regulators, Alkaloids, Steroids, terpenoids);

2) application of tissue and cell cultures for rapid micropropagation and plant pathogen elimination (indexing/sanitation);

3) technologies involving genetic manipulations on Tissues, Cells, and isolated protoplasts.

Plant cell lines serve as producers of valuable substances. They are capable of accumulating useful products several times more efficiently than the intact plants themselves. For instance, mutant cell lines of Rauwolfia serpentina contain 10 times more ajmaline—an alkaloid of high medical value—than the parent plants. A cell strain of Ruta graveolens has been developed that contains 220 times more of the alkaloid rutacridone than the wild plant. PLANT CELL CULTURE is widely employed on an industrial scale to obtain physiologically active compounds. The production of ginseng biomass has been successfully established to meet the needs of the cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries. Another major direction of cell engineering is micropropagation based on tissue culture. Using this method, anywhere from 10,000 to 1 million plants can be obtained from a single cell within a year. Cell engineering techniques also make it possible to shorten the breeding process from 10–12 years down to 3–4 years.

A promising approach for breeding new varieties is Cell Fusion, which enables the production of hybrids by overcoming interspecific incompatibility. Through cell fusion techniques, hybrids between various plant species have been successfully obtained, including potato, tomato, and tobacco; tobacco and potato; rapeseed and turnip; and tobacco and deadly nightshade (belladonna). By utilizing hybrids between cultivated and wild species, researchers can develop novel agricultural plant varieties.