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Nowadays, we are witnesses of environmental degradation, which significantly disrupts the
ecological balance. For millennia, the Earth was powerful enough to neutralize the negative effects
of human activities, but since the beginning of industrial revolution and acceleration in
technological development, insufficiently developed ecological awareness led to rapid depletion of
natural resources and environmental degradation. Climate change, global warming, environmental
pollution and biodiversity loss may be one of the greatest threats facing our planet. Moreover, over
the last decades, changes in climatic conditions and pollution have caused intensive decline
especially in conifers vitality and fertility. All these facts emphasize the importance for the
immediate development of long-range strategies, both biotechnological and conventional ones, for
sustainable development of forestry and forestry-based industry also in Europe. Therefore, we need
consistent production of the genetically superior trees over time; flexibility of rapidly deploy
suitable clones given changing breeding goals and/or environmental conditions; and ability to
manage genetic diversity and genetic gain in plantation forestry. Forestry today is on the threshold
of the widespread introduction of biotechnology into its operational practices – mainly thanks to
the progress with the biotechnological methods of vegetative propagation – micropropagation
(organogenesis and somatic embryogenesis). Somatic embryogenesis is an important
biotechnological technique which can be used in studies related to environmental stress.
The aim of this work was to set up a test system for investigation of the ability of silver fir and
Norway spruce to undergo somatic embryogenesis under the heavy metal stress. Early somatic
embryos (ESEs) of different cell lines of both species were grown on media enriched with three
different concentrations (50, 250, and 500 µM) of cadmium (Cd2+) and lead (Pb2+). Thus, the
response was observed during proliferation, maturation and germination stages. The analysis
showed that a simple in vitro laboratory test might be an indicative tool to evaluate
phytoremediation potential of a considerable number of cell lines in a short period. Moreover,
experimentation on tolerance to a metal is the first step towards identification of potential species
for phytoremediation.
