Plant tissue culture: a biological tool for solving the problem of propagation of medicinally important woody plants- A review.

The world has a very rich biodiversity of woody plants, many of which are medicinally important. Because of the use in medicine, woody plants require rapid and reliable methods of propagation. The conventional methods of propagation such as cuttings, graftings and layering are very slow. The rapid loss of rooting ability with age of woody plants makes them difficult to propagate. So, they require alternative method. Plant propagation by tissue culture is the possible approach to overcome the problem. Plant tissue culture technique allows mass multiplication and propagation under aseptic conditions and it is not dependent on the season for the availability of plant material. Also, it offers a viable tool for meeting the pharmaceutical needs. In the present report, efforts are made to solve the problems of propagation of medicinally important woody plants through tissue culture technique.