Micropropagation

Micropropagation or tissue culture is the practice of rapidly multiplying plant stock material to produce many progeny plants, using modern plant tissue culture methods.

Micropropagation is used to multiply a wide variety of plants, such as those that have been genetically modified or bred through conventional plant breeding methods. It is also used to provide a sufficient number of plantlets for planting from seedless plants, plants that do not respond well to vegetative reproduction or where micropropagation is the cheaper means of propagating (e.g. Orchids). Cornell University botanist Frederick Campion Steward discovered and pioneered micropropagation and plant tissue culture in the late 1950s and early 1960s.