An efficient in vitro thin cell layer multiplication and enhanced saponin production of Dianthus chinensis L.: A cultivated Chinese medicinal crop

An experiment was conducted to evaluate the overproduction of dianchinenoside saponins in one of the traditional Chinese medicinal crops, Chinese pink (Dianthus chinensis L.). To achieve medicinal demand for the metabolites, a protocol for efficient in vitro biomass and enhanced saponins production has been attained. The thin cell layer (TCL) culture of Chinese pink offers an alternative way to enrich in vitro biomass production. Significant effects of transverse thin cell layer (tTCL) explants (∼0.5 mm) were found to induce a large number of shoot buds (48.33), when tTCL raised callus transferred onto 5 µM BA supplemented Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium. The excised microshoots from tTCL raised cultures on 5 µM BA have been shown to have the highest saponins content through agitated adventitious shoots cultures. The elicitation with 100 µM methyl jasmonate on adventitious shoot cultures raised in 5 µM BA resulted in 4.2 mg g−1 DW saponins and, specifically the highest dianchinenoside-B (Dch-B) accumulation (759.35 µg g−1 DW; 4.0-fold change over source plant) after 5 days. 5 µM cobalt chloride supplementation induced 1.6 and 3.1-fold increments of saponins and Dch-B compared to control raised in 2.5 µM BA, respectively. At the same time, 2.1–fold Dch-B (394.48 µg g−1 DW) content was detected in 250 µM biosynthesized silver nanoparticle mediated elicitation. The overall finding of the present study highlights the novel merits of tTCL cultures, and different elicitation has a promising application in the enhancement of the new saponin Dch-B in D. chinensis shoot cultures, which remained unrevealed so far.