MERISTEM CULTURE

• MERISTEM CULTURE
= in vitro culture technique which uses
meristem as an explant.
Longitudinal section of a shoot tip
 Meristem A clump of rapidly dividing
cells

Primary Secondary
meristem meristem

Leaf meristem

Root
meristem
 HISTORY
White (1934)
Tobacco Mozaic Virus (TMV) was unevenly distributed at
different zone of tobacco root. It’s concentration was lower
near the root tip, and the root tip itself was free from virus..
Limasset dan Cornuet (1949)
There was a virus gradient at tobacco root, where it’s mersitem
was virus free.
Morel dan Martin (1952)
Isolated an apical meristem of virus-invected Dahlia to
produce virus free plants.
 GENERAL
PRINCIPLE
Meristem culture technique is carried out
with a view to obtain a virus free plant from
virus-invected plants.
Meristem culture is used to eliminate virus, so
virus will not be distributed which leads to
the production of virus free plants.
Mechanism

1. There is a competition between

new cell production and virus
particle production in the
meristem during cell divisions.
Nucleic acid synthesis is used to
produce new cells, which inhibit
virus multiplication.
Mechanism

2. There is no vascular tissue in the

meristem which hinder virus particle
transport.

3. There is no plasmodesmata in the

meristem which resulted in the low
concentration of virus in the meristem
area.
Mechanism

4. High concentration of auxin dan

Cytokinin in the meristem which
block virus penetration or inactivate
virus particle.
(Quak, 1966)
Mechanism

5. The Enzyme needed for virus

multiplication is not found in the
meristem (Mellor and Stacey-Smith,
1969)

6. The presence of natural inhibitor in the

meristem (Martin-Tanguy et all, 1976)
 FACTOR

 Shoot type (terminal or axiler)

 Position (basal or terminal)
 Season
 Media
Temperature
 pH
 Production of virus free plants

Meristem culture
Heat treatment (35-38 oC)
Effective against viruses and mycoplasma
Can be ineffective to plant which is sensitive to heat

 Heat Treatment and meristem culture

Adventitious shoot formation followed by meristem
culture
Callus and proptoplast culture
Micrografting from virus-free seedling
 Bagan produksi tanaman bebas virus

tanaman yang
propagasi lebih lanjut
terinfeksi virus
dari tanaman bebas
penyakit

(perlakuan panas)

tanaman bebas
kultur meristem virus

(uji virus)

pembentukan tunas uji virus

multiplikasi tunas

memindahkan
pembentukan akar tanaman ke tanah
dari tunas