Summary

In 2002 the 100th anniversary of the publication on "Culturversuche mit isolierten Pflanzenzellen" by Gottlieb Haberlandt was celebrated. Haberlandt´s vision of the totipotency of plant cells represents the actual beginning of tissue culture. This book pays homage to a great Austrian scientist and the further development of his ideas.The first part of the book contains a facsimile of the original paper which is a true artistic masterpiece and its first translation into English from 1969. The second and third parts describe Haberlandt´s life and work and early historical aspects of the development of plant tissue culture.The fourth part of the book contains an overview of important topics of plant tissue culture with the most promising areas of application to date and an outlook into the future. Areas range from micropropagation, production of pharmaceutically interesting compounds, plant breeding, genetic engineering of crop plants, including trees, and cryopreservation of valuable germplasm.