Hairy root culture

Hairy root culture, also called transformed root culture, is a type of plant tissue culture that is used to study plant metabolic processes or to produce valuable secondary metabolites or recombinant proteins, often with plant genetic engineering.[1]

A naturally occurring soil bacterium Agrobacterium rhizogenes that contains root-inducing plasmids (also called Ri plasmids) can infect plant roots and cause them to produce a food source for the bacterium, opines, and to grow abnormally.[2] The abnormal roots are particularly easy to culture in artificial media because hormones are not needed in contrast to adventitious roots,[2] and they are neoplastic, with indefinite growth. The neoplastic roots produced by A. rhizogenes infection have a high growth rate (compared to untransformed adventitious roots), as well as genetic and biochemical stability.

Currently the main constraint for commercial utilization of hairy root culture is the development and up-scaling of appropriate (bioreactors) vessels for the delicate and sensitive hairy roots.[2][3][4]

Some of the applied research on utilization of hairy root cultures has been and is conducted at VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland.[5][6] Other labs working on hairy roots are the phytotechnology lab of Amiens University and the Arkansas Biosciences Institute.

  1. ^ Sévon, Nina; Oksman-Caldentey, Kirsi-Marja (October 2002). "Agrobacterium rhizogenes-mediated transformation: root cultures as a source of alkaloids". Planta Medica. 68 (10): 859–868. doi:10.1055/s-2002-34924. PMID 12391546.
  2. ^ a b c Shanks, Jacqueline V; Morgan, John (April 1999). "Plant 'hairy root' culture". Current Opinion in Biotechnology. 10 (2): 151–5. doi:10.1016/S0958-1669(99)80026-3. PMID 10209145.
  3. ^ Guillon, Stéphanie; Trémouillaux-Guiller, Jocelyne; Pati, Pratap Kumar; Rideau, Marc; Gantet, Pascal (June 2006). "Hairy root research: recent scenario and exciting prospects". Current Opinion in Plant Biology. 9 (3): 341–346. doi:10.1016/j.pbi.2006.03.008. PMID 16616871.
  4. ^ Kowalczyk, Tomasz; Sitarek, Przemysław; Toma, Monika; Rijo, Patricia; Domínguez-Martín, Eva; Falcó, Irene; Sánchez, Gloria; Śliwiński, Tomasz (August 2021). "Enhanced Accumulation of Betulinic Acid in Transgenic Hairy Roots of Senna obtusifolia Growing in the Sprinkle Bioreactor and Evaluation of Their Biological Properties in Various Biological Models". Chemistry & Biodiversity. 18 (8): e2100455. doi:10.1002/cbdv.202100455. hdl:10261/247635. ISSN 1612-1872. PMID 34185351. S2CID 235672736.
  5. ^ Häkkinen, Suvi T.; Moyano, Elisabeth; Cusidó, Rosa M.; Palazón, Javier; Piñol, M. Teresa; Oksman-Caldentey, Kirsi-Marja (1 October 2005). "Enhanced secretion of tropane alkaloids in Nicotiana tabacum hairy roots expressing heterologous hyoscyamine-6β-hydroxylase". Journal of Experimental Botany. 56 (420): 2611–2618. doi:10.1093/jxb/eri253.
  6. ^ Ritala, Anneli; Dong, Lemeng; Imseng, Nicole; Seppänen-Laakso, Tuulikki; Vasilev, Nikolay; van der Krol, Sander; Rischer, Heiko; Maaheimo, Hannu; Virkki, Arho; Brändli, Johanna; Schillberg, Stefan; Eibl, Regine; Bouwmeester, Harro; Oksman-Caldentey, Kirsi-Marja (April 2014). "Evaluation of tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum L. cv. Petit Havana SR1) hairy roots for the production of geraniol, the first committed step in terpenoid indole alkaloid pathway". Journal of Biotechnology. 176: 20–28. doi:10.1016/j.jbiotec.2014.01.031. PMID 24530945.