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Dionaea muscipula Ellis (Venus Flytrap): In Vitro Cultures and in Vitro Production of Secondary Metabolites

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Medicinal and Aromatic Plants XII

Part of the book series: Biotechnology in Agriculture and Forestry ((AGRICULTURE,volume 51))

Abstract

In 1768, William Young, the royal botanist, imported living plants of the Venus fly-trap to England. They were shown to John Ellis, a member of the Royal Society, who recognised the Venus as a carnivorous plant. He wrote a letter and sent it with a dried plant to the Swedish scientist, Carl von Linné. Among others Ellis wrote: “Nature may have some views towards its nourishment in forming the upper joint of its leaf like a machine to catch food: upon the middle of this lies the bait for the unhappy insect that becomes its prey . .. the two lobes rise up, grasp it fast, lock the rows of spines together, and squeeze it to death ... the small erect spines are fixed near the middle of each lobe, over the glands, that effectually put an end to all its struggles”. Linné gave this species the name Dionaea muscipula Ellis (Slack 1985; Juniper et al. 1989). This name comes from the Greek word Dionaia, the goddess of love.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Botanical Garden, University of Wrocław, ul. Sienkiewicza 23, 50-335, Wrocław, Poland

    K. Kukułczanka

  2. Department of Pharmaceutical Botany, Karol Marcinkowski University of Medical Sciences in Poznań, ul. św. Marii Magdaleny 14, 61-861, Poznarń, Poland

    J. Budzianowski

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  1. K. Kukułczanka
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  1. Graduate School of Science, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, 113-0033, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, Japan

    Toshiyuki Nagata

  2. Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, 113-0033, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, Japan

    Yutaka Ebizuka

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Kukułczanka, K., Budzianowski, J. (2002). Dionaea muscipula Ellis (Venus Flytrap): In Vitro Cultures and in Vitro Production of Secondary Metabolites. In: Nagata, T., Ebizuka, Y. (eds) Medicinal and Aromatic Plants XII. Biotechnology in Agriculture and Forestry, vol 51. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-08616-2_4

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