The utility of electrospun nanofibre mats for in vitro germination of Artabotrys hexapetalus pollen

Abstract

This study investigates the influence of electrospun fibre mats on in vitro pollen germination of Artabotrys hexapetalus (L.f.) Bhandari (synonym: A. odoratissimus R. Brown). There was no difference in the size of the pollen from two closely related stages of flower development, namely the yellow florets and yellowish orange florets. On agarbased medium supplemented with 20% sucrose, about 50% of the pollen from the yellowish orange florets germinated but only 25% of those from the yellow florets did. More pollen from the yellowish orange florets germinated in liquid medium than on agar-gelled medium but pollen tube elongation was greater in agar-gelled medium. Electrospinning of synthetic polymer solutions of polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) or polylactic acid (PLA) was used to generate mats composed of nonwoven (randomly oriented) nanofibres as well as those composed of a mixture of nonwoven and aligned (PVDF4 and PLA4) nanofibres. Compared with liquid, agar medium, and other types of nanofibre mats, PVDF4 was found to be the best physical support substrate for germination of the pollen from the yellowish orange florets (70%) and tube growth (about 400% increase over that in liquid medium). Pollen germination was largely inhibited on all four types of 18 µm thick nanofibre mats but not on the 8 µm thick ones.

Growth and root formation in the microshoots of three basils cultured in vitro on different types and patterns of electrospun nanofibre mats

“…Electrospun nanofibre mats were first used in plant tissue culture for callus induction and subculture (Bodhipadma et al, 2011) and later for pollen germination (Bodhipadma et al, 2016). In both studies, there were also different growth responses on the diverse types and patterns of nanofibre mats as found in the present research.…”

“…An electrospun nanofibre mat is a physical support matrix containing tens to hundreds of nanometer or sub-nanometer fibres which were electrospun and conventionally fabricated into mats with the fibre in random, aligned or patterned arrangements (Bodhipadma et al, 2016;Mahjour et al, 2016;Jian et al, 2018;Kozior et al, 2019). These electrospun ultrafine fibres could be produced from inorganic or organic compounds, for example, polylactic acid, -2 -polyvinylidene fluoride (Bodhipadma et al, 2011), polycaprolactone (Chanunpanich & Suwanboon, 2014), fish skin gelatin (Songchotikunpan et al, 2008) and lignin (Hong et al, 2019).…”

“…In plant tissue culture, electrospun nanofibre mats have recently been applied in a few experiments, for instance, as a scaffold for callus induction and culture of aromatic chilli and bilimbi (Bodhipadma et al, 2011) and a physical support substrate for germination of the Artabotrys hexapetalus pollen (Bodhipadma et al, 2016). A microshoot is an explant comprising the apical meristem with a minimal amount of other shoot tissues.…”