Biotechnology can offer useful tools to complement conventional breeding programs. The techniques of in vitro selection, that exploit phenomenon, called somaclonal variation, by screening cell cultures for resistance to herbicides, different types of stress or diseases, already helped to obtain tolerant lines of flax (Linum usitatissimum), which were used in further commercial breeding programs...

There are some reports on the lignan constituents of Linum spp. In this study, we investigated the cyototoxicity of Linum spp. in vitro cultures for the first time. If they show significant cytotoxic activity, they will be valuable candidates for isolation of cytotoxic compounds in large scale from them by tissue culture technology. In our study, we chose normal root, hairy root and calli cultu...

sanguine expectations which were formed with regard to it when first its remarkable effects on the eye became known, the plant itself is undoubtedly destined to become a product of much commercial importance, and already its cultivation, with this view, is being actively prosecuted in Madras and Ceylon. In the botanic gardens of the latter country the coca plant has been growing since 1870, and...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS The nuclear DNA of certain varieties of flax (Linum usitatissimum) can vary within a single generation when the plants are grown under specific environmental conditions. This review details the genomic variations that have been identified and associated with this environmental response. CONCLUSIONS The variation occurs across the whole spectrum of sequence repetition and h...

Cultivated flax (Linum usitatissimum L.) is the earliest oil and fiber crop and its early domestication history may involve multiple events of domestication for oil, fiber, capsular indehiscence, and winter hardiness. Genetic studies have demonstrated that winter cultivated flax is closely related to oil and fiber cultivated flax and shows little relatedness to its progenitor, pale flax (L. bie...

For the first time callus and suspension cultures of Linum mucronatum ssp. annenum were initiated, grown in darkness at 25 degrees C and analyzed for lignans. 6-Methoxypodophyllotoxin was the main lignan besides smaller amounts of podophyllotoxin isolated and identified by chromatographic methods as well as by 1H NMR.

Podophyllotoxins represent an important and unique position among natural products. They serve as the starting material for the semi-synthetic anticancer drugs etopside and teniposide, so considerable attention has focused on the availability of these aryltetralin lignans. Linum is one of the genera, with some reports on the presence of podophyllotoxin and related compounds, such as L. album, L...