We measured and studied the growth parameters and the qualitative and quantitative composition of the flavones of hairy roots of the Scutellaria genus: S. lateriflora, S. przewalskii and S. pycnoclada. Hairy roots were obtained using wild-type Agrobacterium rhizogenes A4 by co-cultivation of explants (cotyledons) in a suspension of Agrobacterium. The presence of the rol-genes was confirmed by PCR analysis. The hairy roots of the most studied plant from the Scutellaria genus, S. baicalensis, were obtained earlier and used as a reference sample. HPLC-MS showed the predominance of four main flavones (baicalin, baicalein, wogonin and wogonoside) in the methanol extracts of the studied hairy roots. In addition to the four main flavones, the other substances which are typical to the aerial part of plants were found in all the extracts: apigenin, apigetrin, scutellarin and chrysin-7-O-β-d-glucuronide. According to the total content of flavones, the hairy roots of the studied skullcaps form the following series: S. przewalskii (33 mg/g dry weight) > S. baicalensis (17.04 mg/g dry weight) > S. pycnoclada (12.9 mg/g dry weight) > S. lateriflora (4.57 mg/g dry weight). Therefore, the most promising producer of anti-coronavirus flavones is S. przewalskii.

Due to population growth, instability of climatic conditions, and reduction of the areas of natural ecosystems, it becomes necessary to involve modern biotechnological approaches to obtain highly productive plant material. This statement applies both to the creation of plant varieties and the production of new pharmaceutical raw materials. Genetic transformation of valuable medicinal plants using Agrobacterium rhizogenes ensures the production of stable and rapidly growing hairy roots cultures that have a number of advantages compared with cell culture and, above all, can synthesize root-specific substances at the level of the roots of the intact plant. In this regard, special attention should be paid to the collection of hairy roots of the Institute of Plant Physiology RAS, Russian Academy of Sciences, the founder of which was Dr. Kuzovkina I.N. Currently, the collection contains 38 hairy roots lines of valuable medicinal and forage plants. The review discusses the prospects of creating a hairy roots collection as a basis for fundamental research and commercial purposes.

Inter-Simple Sequence Repeat (ISSR) and retrotransposon-microsatellite amplified polymorphism (REMAP) markers were applied to study the influence of successive steps of dehydration cryopreservation on DNA in recovered calli and regenerated plants of spring wheat (Triticum aestivum L.). The precultivation step had no influence on the genetic stability of plant material. After the dehydration step, a new fragment appeared in the REMAP profiles for one DNA sample of calli of Nv16 line. A fragment of similar length was observed in one DNA sample for calli regenerated after complete procedure of cryopreservation in liquid nitrogen (−196°C). However, in samples of calli cultured in vitro for two and four weeks after any type of treatments, the amplicon spectra exhibited no difference from those of starting materials. The amplicon profiles of plants regenerated from calli after successive steps of cryopreservation were also identical to the profiles of the mother plants.

Scutellaria baicalensis is the most studied species of the genus, while Scutellaria pycnoclada is a poorly studied endemic species. Ten lines of the hairy roots of S. pycnoclada were obtained using Agrobacterium rhizogenes A4. The hairy root cultures of S. pycnoclada and the previously obtained roots of S. baicalensis were cultured on liquid and agar Gamborg media. A total of 14 flavonoids were detected via HPLC MS/MS in S. pycnoclada, and 17 were detected in S. baicalensis. Among them were flavones characteristic of both the roots and the aboveground parts of the plants. S. pycnoclada had a lower diversity of methylated flavones than S. baicalensis. Moreover, tenaxin I was absent in all S. pycnoclada lines on agar medium. HPLC analysis revealed that the flavone content in the different hairy root lines was 1.4–12.7 times higher on liquid medium than on agar medium. S. baicalensis and S. pycnoclada differed significantly in the ratio of the main flavones. In S. baicalensis, baicalin (7.83 mg/g DW) and wogonoside (6.29 mg/g DW) dominated when cultured on liquid medium, and wogonin (2.08 mg/g DW) dominated when cultured on solid medium. In S. pycnoclada, baicalin predominated (52–88% of the total content). S. pycnoclada is assumed to have a different set of O-methyltransferases and less biosynthetic enzyme activity than S. baicalensis.

A cryopreservation method developed earlier was modified for freezing of calli derived from mature embryos of four spring wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) pure lines. The effects of particular stages of cryopreservation protocol on water content, number of calli recovering growth, and rate of morphogenesis were analyzed. Regrowth was observed in 90.5–100% of calli after dehydration and in 93.3–100% after freezing-thawing. Dehydration, but not freeze-thawing significantly decreased the frequency of morphogenetic variation.