Plant cell totipotency: Plant tissue culture applications-an updated review

Plant tissue culture is the fastest in vitro cloning method used in the production of secondary metabolites and phytoconstituents often difficult to regenerate and conserve the species saving them from extinction. Plant tissue culture can be used for a wide range of purposes with various applications in research and industry. The resulting clones are true to type of selected genotypes and used for the large scale plant multiplication. Plant in vitro propagation using tissue culture techniques have been exploited for the commercialization of ornamental plants (orchids), vegetable and fruit plants (papaya, mango, and grape), medicinal, woody plants, teak (Tectona grandis and sandalwood (Santalum album) and conifers with economically important products. There are many applications of plant tissue culture which is used in the production of somatic embryos, plant regeneration via organogenesis, germplasm conservation, synthetic seeds, protoplast culture for the production of somatic hybrids, anther culture for the production of haploids, synthesis of secondary metabolites of pharmaceutical interest, and plant cells used for the bioenergy. Since plant tissue culture is simple, low-cost and environment friendly, it is imperative to employ this technique for the development of sustainable agriculture in order to meet the food demand of increasing human population. However, the plant tissue culture technique also has limitations of somaclonal variation resulting in the chimeric plants with low yields. Reprogramming of plant somatic cells under in vitro conditions towards somatic embryogenesis is also a challenging process since many factors and signaling molecules govern and controlled the process.