Encapsulation of In Vitro-Derived Explants: An Innovative Tool for Nurseries
The encapsulation technology consists of the inclusion of some millimeter-long plant portions in a nutritive and protective matrix. This technology represents a further and promising tool for exchange of plant material between private and public plant tis
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1. Introduction The nurserymen put all efforts to produce true-to-type and pathogensfree plant material, which is achieved by vegetative multiplication (or propagation) techniques and certification procedures, respectively. These tools are effective to assure high-quality of plants to the marketing systems. Since the world’s demand for new and promising forestry, ornamental and horticultural genotypes is increasing, nursery operators are looking for research support and new strategies to produce plants by innovative and reliable effective technologies (1). Moreover, they are faced with intransigent regulations aimed to prevent the introduction of devastating pathogens with the infected plant material in most of the countries.
Maurizio Lambardi et al. (eds.), Protocols for Micropropagation of Selected Economically-Important Horticultural Plants, Methods in Molecular Biology, vol. 994, DOI 10.1007/978-1-62703-074-8_31, © Springer Science+Business Media New York 2013
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A. Standardi and M. Micheli
So, besides the traditional multiplication techniques such as grafting, cutting and layering, micropropagation is highly successful for large-scale plant production, maintaining their genetic fidelity and health. Nevertheless, large-scale deployment of the in vitro-derived plantlets implicates some practical problems during their management in the nursery. In fact, after the acclimatization, the plants are cultivated in the field, and face pests, pathogens and environmental and agronomic stresses, which are similarly faced by plants produced with traditional propagation methods. So, micropropagated plants can lose some advantages before the commercialization, precisely when the sanitary requirements have to be respected. In addition, the use of the micropropagated plants, which are not easy to manage, store, or transport and are exposed to the deterioration and damage risks, seems to have some commercial limits in comparison with the zygotic or gamic seeds, which combine advantages of reduced size, handling, storability and transportability (2), although they cannot be used for propagation of clones, especially if obtained by open pollination. Therefore, the research is looking for new technologies that are able to join the advantages of micropropagation, as high productive efficiency, perfect sanitary plant conditions, reduced space requirements, with the characteristics of the zygotic seed (3). The encapsulation technology can integrate the micropropagation to reduce the incidence of the problems above reported. As below described in detail, two different products can be obtained from this technology: capsule and synthetic seed (Fig. 1).
2. Encapsulation Technology: Concepts, Procedure, and Applications
The concept of the encapsulation technology was born to satisfy the requirement of somatic embryos protection during their transport and manipulation in nurseries or in farms. In fact, Murashige (4) gave the first definition of synthetic seed (or artificial seed or synseed) as “an encapsulated single somatic em
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