Biology · Biotechnology and Its Applications · NEET
They are closely linked but not the same. Tissue culture is the general technique of growing a plant part (explant) in a sterile nutrient medium. Micropropagation is one specific use of tissue culture: producing thousands of plants quickly from one plant. So micropropagation is done BY tissue culture, but tissue culture also has other uses.
All the new plants grow from the cells of a single parent plant by mitosis (normal cell division). Mitosis copies the DNA exactly, so no new gene mixing happens (there is no fertilisation, no meiosis). That is why every somaclone carries the same genes as the parent and as each other.
Micropropagation makes many identical copies of ONE plant, so the product is genetically the same as the parent. Somatic hybridisation fuses protoplasts of TWO different plants to make a new hybrid with mixed traits (like the pomato). One clones, the other combines.
They are the same. Since they are somaclones, they are genetically identical to the original plant from which they were grown. This is why micropropagation is used when you want to keep a desirable variety exactly as it is.
NCERT names tomato, banana, and apple as important food plants produced on a commercial scale using micropropagation.
Try the real previous-year questions from this chapter — each with the answer and a full solution.
Micropropagation is the method of producing thousands of plants in a short time through plant tissue culture.
Somaclones are the plants produced by micropropagation; they are genetically identical to the original parent plant from which they were grown.
You can produce a very large number of plants that are genetically identical to a chosen parent, in a very short time and in a small space, all year round.
No. It uses an explant (any plant part) grown in a nutrient medium, not seeds. This is useful for plants that are hard to grow from seeds.
Tomato, banana and apple are produced on a commercial scale using micropropagation, as stated in NCERT.
