METHOD FOR CULTURING PLANT CALLUS USING LOW-MOLECULAR WEIGHT CHITOSAN

PURPOSE:To reduce microbial contamination, improve proliferation rate and enable production of useful ingredients outside plant cells by culturing plant callus using a low-molecular weight chitosan having 1,500 to 30,000 molecular weight. CONSTITUTION:In primary culture for preparing substances up to adventitious callus, a low-molecular weight chitosan having 1,500 to 30,000 molecular weight regulated to a desired pH and concentration is used to prepare an aqueous chitosan solution, which is used to produce a solid culture medium. Sterilization is carried out according to a conventional method to carry out transplantation of the objective plant cells. Proliferation is then performed in a clean bench. In the secondary culture for adding various chemicals to further differentiate the callus and accumulating useful ingredients, the same low-molecular weight chitosan solution as that prepared in the primary culture is also used as microbial countermeasures or for the purpose of increasing the culture rate in the system. Liquid culture is carried out for producing the resultant useful ingredients such as tropane alkaloids, saponin and pigments outside the plant cells. Thereby, microbial contamination is reduced to improve the proliferation rate. The plant cells can also be reutilized.