TECHNOVA
Cryopreservation - An Innovation in Field of Biotechnology
by Swati Jain
M.Sc. BioTechnology, Guna
The principle underlying Cryopreservation basically involves bringing the plant cell and tissue culture to a non dividing or zero metabolism state by subjecting to a super low temperature in the presence or absence of cryoprotectants. In this technique plant material is frozen and maintained at the temperature of liquid nitrogen (LN) which is around -196 C or -150 C in the vapour phase. Cryopreservation is an established method of storing sperm cells in order to use them for artificial insemination during animal breeding programmes.
The progress made in the area of plant cryobiology since 1975 , has shown that entire plant can now be regenerated from cells , meristems and embryos frozen and stored in for long period of time . This technique is successfully applied for germplasm conservation of a wide range of plant species, such as a cassava, pea, chick-pea, rice, wheat, peanut, coconut, oil palm, strawberry and sugarcane and other agri-horiculture crops.
This technique of Cryopreservation takes place in the following steps:
- Choice of material.
- Preculture.
- Cryoprotection.
- Freezing.
- Thawing.
- Reculture.