Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 Aug 30;25(1):1162.
doi: 10.1186/s12870-025-07062-z.

Enhancing the accumulation of scopolamine and atropine in Hyoscyamus niger L. callus by LED light and glycine-a cheap method

Rasoul Heydarnajad Giglou  1 , Mousa Torabi Giglou  2 , Ali Sobhanizadeh  1   3 , Antoni Szumny  4
Affiliations

Enhancing the accumulation of scopolamine and atropine in Hyoscyamus niger L. callus by LED light and glycine-a cheap method

Rasoul Heydarnajad Giglou et al. BMC Plant Biol. .

Abstract

Background: The production of tropane alkaloids such as atropine and scopolamine by chemical methods is costly. This study aimed to find a more efficient method for producing tropane alkaloids by investigating different LED light qualities and glycine treatment using leaf callus cultures of Hyoscyamus niger L. in vitro.

Results: In this study, after producing healthy plantlets, callus induction was done in the B5 medium with 2-4-D (2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid) at 2 mg L-1 with BA (6-benzyl adenine) at a concentration of 1 mg L-1. The use of LED light and glycine treatments started from the callus stage, in such a way that the callus produced was placed in culture media containing different concentrations of glycine (0, 2, 4 and 8 mg L-1). They were transferred to light boxes, and light treatments were applied at 4 levels (darkness (D), white LED light (WLED), blue LED light (BLED), and red LED light (RLED)). The results demonstrate that, glycine had a significant impact on the accumulation of total carbohydrates and total amino acids, quercetin, total phenols and total flavonoids in H. niger L. callus under LED light qualities. The highest atropine was obtained under Blue LED (BLED) conditions with the glycine at mg L-1, while the highest scopolamine was observed under BLED conditions with glycine at 4 mg L-1. Also, the highest gallic acid levels (4.18 mg g-1) were observed in callus grown under BLED and RED LED (RLED) light conditions with glycine at 8 mg L-1.

Conclusion: In the present study, we have developed an efficient protocol for the production of tropane alkaloids by investigating different LED light colors and glycine treatments exploiting in vitro callus cultures of H.niger. These findings could have potential applications in the pharmaceutical and food industries for efficiently producing high-valued alkaloids from the plants.

Keywords: Hyoscyamus niger; Atropine; Glycine; LED light quality; Scopolamine.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Ethics approval and consent to participate: All methods performed in this study including the plant tissue culture were in compliance with the relevant institutional, national, and international guidelines and legislation. Consent for publication: Not applicable. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Healthy plantlets of Hyoscyamus niger L. grown in Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Effect of culture medium on callus formation in Hyoscyamus niger L. plant. Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium (a) and the B5 culture medium (b) with 2 mg L−1 2–4-D and 1 mg L−1 BA were used
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
The effect of LED light quality and Glycine on the amount of FW and DW, the callus induced from the Hyoscyamus niger L. in B5 culture medium. Glycine at 0, 2, 4, and 8 mg L−1, D, R, B and W indicate darkness, red, blue, and white LED light quality, respectively. Based on Duncan’s multiple range test, the whiskers represent the standard deviation, and the values marked with the same letter are not significantly different (P < 0.05)
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Changes in TFC (a), TPC (b), and TAC (DPPH) (c) in Hyoscyamus niger L. callus under LED light quality and glycine. Glycine at 0, 2, 4 and 8 mg L−1, D, R, B and W indicate darkness, red, blue and white LED light quality, respectively. Based on Duncan’s multiple range test, the whiskers represent the standard deviation and the values ​​marked with the same letter are not significantly different (P < 0.05)
Fig. 5
Fig. 5
Changes of TCc (a) and TAMc (b) in Hyoscyamus niger L. callus under LED light quality and glycine. Glycine at 0, 2, 4 and 8 mg L−1, D, R, B and W indicate darkness, red, blue and white LED light quality, respectively. Based on Duncan’s multiple range test, the whiskers represent the standard deviation and the values ​​marked with the same letter are not significantly different (P < 0.05)
Fig. 6
Fig. 6
The effect of LED light quality (a) and (b) on TAKc in Hyoscyamus niger L. callus. Glycine at 0, 2, 4 and 8 mg L−1, D, R, B and W indicate darkness, red, blue and white LED light quality, respectively. Based on Duncan’s multiple range test, the whiskers represent the standard deviation and the values ​​marked with the same letter are not significantly different (P < 0.05)
Fig. 7
Fig. 7
Changes of GA (a) and (b) quercetin in Hyoscyamus niger L. callus under LED light quality and glycine. Glycine at 0, 2, 4 and 8 mg L−1, D, R, B and W indicate darkness, red, blue and white LED light quality, respectively Whiskers indicate standard deviation and the values marked with the same letter do not differ significantly according to the Duncan’s multiple range tests (P < 0.05)
Fig. 8
Fig. 8
Analysis of scopolamine (a) and atropine (b) in Hyoscyamus niger L. callus by HPLC (High Performance Liquid Chromatography)
Fig. 9
Fig. 9
Changes of atropine (a) scopolamine (b) in Hyoscyamus niger L. callus under LED light quality and glycine in B5 culture medium, by HPLC method. Glycine at 0, 2, 4 and 8 mg L−1, D, R, B and W indicate darkness, red, blue and white LED light quality, respectively Whiskers indicate standard deviation and the values marked with the same letter do not differ significantly according to the Duncan’s multiple range tests (P < 0.05)
Fig. 10
Fig. 10
Heat map of the average accumulation of tropane alkaloid in the dry weight of Hyoscyamus niger L. callus in the condition of LED light quality. The rows show the accumulation of secondary metabolites in dry weight and the columns show the different treatments (Glycine at the concentration of 0, 2, 4, and 8 mg L−1) D, B, R, and W, respectively, it refers to dark blue, red and white LED light. FW and DW represent the fresh weight and dry weight of the callus, respectively
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

References

    1. Abbasi BH, Tian C-L, Murch SJ, Saxena PK, Liu C-Z. Light-enhanced caffeic acid derivatives biosynthesis in hairy root cultures of Echinacea purpurea. Plant Cell Rep. 2007;26:1367–72. - PubMed
    1. Acharjee S, Kumar R, Kumar N. Role of plant biotechnology in enhancement of alkaloid production from cell culture system of Catharanthus roseus: a medicinal plant with potent anti-tumor properties. Ind Crop Prod. 2022;176: 114298.
    1. Adil M, Ren X, Jeong BR. Light elicited growth, antioxidant enzymes activities and production of medicinal compounds in callus culture of Cnidium officinale Makino. J Photochem Photobiol B. 2019;196: 111509. - PubMed
    1. Ahmadianfar S, Mehrabi N, Mohammadi S, Sobhanizadeh A, Moradabadi A, Noroozi-Aghideh A. Effects of horsetail, alfalfa, ortie, chêne and Aleppo oak as potential hemostatic agents on laboratory coagulation tests. Nat Prod Sci. 2023;29(1):42–9.
    1. Al Murad M, Razi K, Jeong BR, Samy PMA, Muneer S. Light emitting diodes (LEDs) as agricultural lighting: impact and its potential on improving physiology, flowering, and secondary metabolites of crops. Sustainability. 2021;13(4):1985.

LinkOut - more resources