Tissue Culture - Overview, Structure, Properties & Uses

Tissue Culture: Definition, Types, Steps, Examples, Diagram, Techniques

Edited By Irshad Anwar | Updated on Jul 25, 2024 02:00 PM IST

Tissue culture is a technique developed in biology and agriculture that works miracles in the propagation and study of cells and tissues.

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What is Tissue Culture?

It is a refined biological technique used in growing and maintaining cells, tissues, or organs outside their natural environment, usually inside a controlled laboratory atmosphere. In this method, a small portion of tissue, known as an explant, is taken from a plant, animal, or microbial source. The explant is transferred into a sterile state in a rich nutrient medium. The culture medium contains all the necessary nutrients, growth factors, and hormones to be used in conditions that promote optimum growth and development.

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What is Tissue Culture?
Types of Tissue Culture
Steps of Tissue Culture
Advantages of Tissue Culture
Importance of Tissue Culture
Advantages and Disadvantages

Tissue Culture: Definition, Types, Steps, Examples, Diagram, Techniques

It is done by creating a strictly controlled environment in tissue culture, which would physiologically provide the optimum setting for cell proliferation and differentiation. The researchers thereby carry on studies of cellular behaviour, conduct various kinds of genetic manipulations, and grow large amounts of uniform cells or tissues that are used in various applications. Tissue culture assumes a central role in joining many advances in biotechnological, medical, agricultural, and environmental conservation domains through studies relating to complex biological activities or improvements in agriculture and therapeutic new remedies.

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Types of Tissue Culture

The types of tissue culture can be broadly categorised into:

Organ Culture

Organ culture is when intact organs or parts of organs are grown under controlled conditions outside the organism's body. The technique helps in maintaining the integrity of the structural and functional properties of organs so that researchers can further elucidate growth, development, and responses to different stimuli. Organ cultures are used by investigators dealing with plants and animals. Plant organ cultures are applied to study root development, flowering patterns, and responses to various environmental stresses. Organ cultures in animals contribute to biomedical research by studying organ-specific functions, mechanisms of various diseases, and possible treatments.

Cell Culture

Cell culture is mainly concerned with the isolation and in vitro growth of single cells or small groups of cells. It is one of the most frequently employed techniques not only throughout biomedical sciences but also in the development of pharmaceuticals and genetic engineering. Cell cultures may be derived from animal tissues, plant tissues, or microbial cultures. They are used to study cellular behaviours like proliferation, differentiation, metabolism, response to drugs or toxins, etc. Tissue culture techniques have become an essential tool in the generation of cell lines, assessment of toxicity tests, and development of therapies against various diseases.

Plant Tissue Culture

Plant tissue culture encompasses a variety of techniques which are oriented towards the propagation and manipulation of plant cells, tissues, or organs in an aseptic environment. It finds extensive applications in agriculture and horticulture for the mass production of disease-free plants, effective multiplication of elite cultivars, and conservation of endangered species. Applications in this field are mostly attributed to micropropagation, somatic embryogenesis, and genetic transformation. Through the development of genetically modified crops that have increased resistance to several pests, diseases and environmental stresses, plant tissue culture has completely revolutionised agricultural practice.

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Animal Tissue Culture

Animal tissue culture is cultivated in a laboratory for research study purposes, testing of pharmaceutical compounds, and medical uses. This forms a very prominent area in understanding cellular physiology, mechanisms of various diseases, and drug responses in the controlled environment of a laboratory. Animal tissue cultures have applications in the development of cell-based assays, the production of vaccines and therapeutic proteins, and the modelling of human diseases in drug discovery and biomedical research. Primary isolation of cells directly from tissues and immortalised cells, otherwise cell lines, are some of the techniques applied in studying a complex biological process and developing novel treatments.

Microbial Culture

Microbial culture is the process of growing and maintaining microorganisms such as bacteria, fungi, algae, etc., in laboratory conditions. It is very important in studies on microbial physiology, genetics, and biochemical pathways. Cultures find application in aspects connected with biotechnology, the production of food, and the control of the environment. They also turn out to be very useful tools in producing antibiotics, enzymes, and biofuels through microbial fermentation processes.

Steps of Tissue Culture

The steps involved in the process of tissue culture are:

Explants and Preparation

Type of Explants Used: Standard explants include shoot tips, embryos, and callus tissues. Each type is applied for certain purposes of tissue culture, like rapid proliferation or genetic transformation.
Techniques of Preparation: These involve surface sterilisation, cutting, and precise dissection so that the explants are properly rid of contaminants, and ready to set in for culture.

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Culture Media

Media Composition: Culture media are composed of some of the basic requirements or nutrients, which involve macro and micronutrients, vitamins, amino acids, and growth regulators like auxins and cytokinins. All these components are added in a balanced way for the cells to grow and differentiate.
Preparation and Sterilisation Methods: Media is prepared by mixing ingredients under sterile conditions. Sterilisation consists of passing media through a filter or autoclaving. This helps to avoid any kind of microbial contamination.

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Culture Conditions

Environmental Control: The temperature, humidity, pH, and CO2 are optimised for successful tissue culture. This supposedly provides the most analogous environment that cells require to proliferate and differentiate.
Incubation and Maintenance: Cultures are incubated in a controlled environment, like growth chambers or bioreactors, where the growth of the cells will proceed and their progress with time is to be traced.

Advantages of Tissue Culture

Provides rapid plant/cell multiplication on a sterile platform.
Facilitates genetic manipulation and selection for the expression of desirable traits.
Production of disease-free plants and tissues.
Studying cellular processes and their responses to external factors.
The continual supply of uniform material for research and commercial purposes.
Tools for in vitro conservation of endangered species by ex-situ methods.

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Importance of Tissue Culture

Tissue culture spans disciplines such as biology, agriculture, and medicine because of its ability to grow cells and tissues in a controlled environment outside their natural context. In agriculture, it provides large-scale production of disease-free plants and propagation of plants that are facing extinction or are genetically altered to have new characteristics, hence advancing agricultural productivity and sustainability initiatives.

Tissue culture has been an immaterially large tool in medicine in studying the mechanisms of many diseases, responses to drugs, and tissue regeneration. This creates the ability needed for the production of cell lines and three-dimensional tissue models, advancing biomedical research into innovations in personalised medicine and pharmaceutical development. Apart from that, tissue culture plays a very vital role in improving food security, understanding human health, and driving forward scientific discovery with huge societal benefits.

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Advantages and Disadvantages

Merits of Tissue Culture

Tissue culture allows swift and efficient propagation of plants and cells from a limited population, thus creating an opportunity for mass production of disease-free plants and also contributing to the conservation of rare species. These, in turn, can facilitate genetic changes to develop crops with desirable traits, thus enhancing agricultural productivity and fertility. It reduces the risk of contamination under aseptic conditions, hence guaranteeing predictable results for experiments.

Challenges and Limitations

It is expensive in terms of special apparatuses and artificial media, the mastery of which requires handling delicate tissues. Despite strict handling, there is a risk of contamination, which can be very frustrating and decrease experimental reliability. A lack of access to resources and technical skills to a large extent may limit its applications, especially in developing regions or smaller research facilities.

Conclusion

Tissue culture has thus been one of the cornerstones of contemporary biological research and agricultural progress. These versatile applications make tissue culture riveting in its revolutionising effects on medicine, biotechnology, and environmental conservation by allowing for the profiling of cellular growth and development under controlled laboratory conditions. From the propagation of crop varieties resistant to disease in agriculture to the conservation of endangered species, mechanisms of diseases and the development of new therapies in medicine, tissue culture has played a very prominent role. With improvements in technologies and working methodologies, tissue culture remains at the very edge of scientific innovation and holds great promise for continued contributions to sustainable agriculture, healthcare outcomes, and the preservation of biodiversity in the coming years.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. What is tissue culture, and how does it work?

Tissue culture refers to the technique of growing cells, tissues, or organs of plants or animals in vitro, proving an excellent opportunity for studies and applications of the knowledge gained in different fields.

2. What are the applications of tissue culture in agriculture?

Tissue culturing is used for the production of disease-free plants, increasing the yield of crops, and genetically modified organisms for improved trait development.

3. How does tissue culture act as a tool in medicine?

In medicine, tissue culture helps in studying a disease, vaccine preparation, and the production of many therapeutic proteins and drugs through cell-based systems.

4. What are the advantages and disadvantages of tissue culture?

The advantages are rapid propagation and genetic manipulation. The disadvantages are high cost, technical complexity of work, and vulnerability to contamination.

5. How can tissue culture benefit genetic research?

Through tissue culture techniques, variations in genes can be studied, genes manipulated, and organisms that are identical in genes can be used for experiments and commercial purposes.