Production of pathogen-free horticultural crops by cryotherapy of in vitro-grown shoot tips.

Horticultural crops are economically valuable for sustainable agricultural production. Plant diseases caused by Pathogens including virus, phytoplasma and bacterium have been a great threat to production of horticultural crops. The efficient use of pathogen-free plant materials has overcome the menace of plant diseases and has sustained crop production.

Cryopreservation of embryogenic cell suspensions by encapsulation-vitrification and encapsulation-dehydration.

Encapsulation-vitrification and encapsulation-dehydration are two newly developed techniques for cryopreservation of embryogenic cell suspensions. Here, we describe the two protocols using grapevine (Vitis) as a model plant. Cell suspensions at the exponential growth stage cultured in a cell suspension maintenance medium are encapsulated to form beads, each being about 4 mm in diameter and containing 25% cells.

Novel and potential application of cryopreservation to plant genetic transformation.

The world population now is 6.7 billion and is predicted to reach 9 billion by 2050. Such a rapid growing population has tremendously increased the challenge for food security.

Cryopreservation of sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas) and its pathogen eradication by cryotherapy.

Sweetpotato (Ipomoea batatas) ranks as the seventh most important staple crop in the world and the fifth in developing countries after rice, wheat, maize and cassava. Sweetpotato is mainly grown in developing countries, which account for more than 95% of total production of the whole world. Genetic resources, including cultivated varieties and wild species, are a prerequisite for novel sweetpotato breeding in both conventional and genetic engineering programs.