Recent Advances in Vegetative Propagation of Plants

The vegetative propagation of plant species is a rapidly evolving field that encompasses a range of scientific disciplines. Vegetative propagation—the process of reproducing plants through non-seed methods, such as cuttings, layering, grafting, or tissue culture—has made significant strides in improving efficiency, consistency, and the sustainability of plant production. From the selection of the explant until the rooting and adaptation of the regenerated plant, researchers need to carefully perform a number of procedures that eventually lead to the optimization of the process. Briefly, some of these procedures include exploring the least harmful yet effective way to sterilize the complex surfaces of the selected explant, adjusting the hormonal balance, environmental factors, and optimizing the manipulation, rooting, and further acclimation of the regenerated plant to ensure that the desirable traits remain true-to-type in the progeny.

This Research Topic aims to address the advancements in the area of vegetative propagation of plants, including methods and techniques for woody, model, horticultural, ornamental, forestry, or endangered species propagation and their applicability on a large scale. The topic will cover significant developments in techniques, technologies, and understanding of plant biology related to vegetative propagation aimed at improving efficiency, overcoming limitations, and exploring new methodologies.

The themes of interest include, but are not limited to:
• Cutting propagation, grafting, layering, and optimization of propagation systems (e.g., mist propagation, hydroponic systems, aeroponics, etc)
• Hormonal regulation for rooting optimization, molecular mechanisms of rooting with special emphasis on hard-to-root species, including woody plants
• Automation and scaling of vegetative propagation, including bioreactors, robotics, sensor systems, and automated tissue culture facilities
• In vitro culture techniques, including micropropagation, and somatic embryogenesis for trees and other woody species; rare or endangered species
• Epigenetic factors and clonal fidelity, somaclonal variations, and influence of environment on epigenetic expression
• Clonal propagation for disease resistance; role of endophytes and symbiotic relationships
• Role of environmental factors such as light, temperature, and watering management in vegetative propagation
• In vitro vs. ex vitro propagation
• Vegetative propagation for crop improvement
• Sustainable practices in vegetative propagation

Purely descriptive studies that do not advance the mechanistic understanding of vegetative plant propagation will not be considered in this collection. Submit it to the journal directly.

Keywords: micropropagation, Vegetative Propagation, Plant Propagation, Clonal Propagation, Asexual Plant Reproduction, Plant Cutting Propagation, Grafting, Layering, Tissue Culture, Plant Biotechnology, Rooting Optimization, Hormonal Regulation in Plants, Plant Growth Regulators, In Vitro Culture, Somatic Embryogenesis, Ex Vitro Propagation, Plant Tissue Culture, Aeroponics, Hydroponics, Mist Propagation, Bioreactors for Plant Propagation, Plant Robotics, Automated Tissue Culture, Somaclonal Variation, Epigenetics in Plants, Clonal Fidelity, Plant Disease Resistance, Endophytes, Plant Symbiosis, Crop Improvement, Sustainable Agriculture, Woody Plant Propagation, Ornamental Plant Propagation, Horticultural Plant Propagation, Endangered Plant Propagation, Methods for vegetative propagation of plants, Techniques for vegetative propagation of trees, Advances in plant cutting propagation, Optimizing rooting in woody plants, Automation in plant tissue culture, Scaling up micropropagation, Role of epigenetics in clonal propagation, Vegetative propagation for disease resistance, Sustainable practices in plant propagation, In vitro vs. ex vitro propagation comparison, Vegetative propagation of endangered species

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.