Agri-Starts Inc is a biological technology company producing and selling tissue culture liners on a wholesale level. Tissue-culture is the duplication of the original plant we put into production, in doing so we have an exact replica of the "mother" plant. We clone plants! Lab technicians use scalpels, microscopes and petri dishes, to produce thousands of little plants from a single, tiny growing tip cut from a superior "mother" plant. Plants are grown on a gelled nutrient rich medium with growth regulators. They are grown in vessels, on shelves, in a sterile laboratory which is temperature and light controlled. Each plant is disease free and can be virus indexed upon request. When the plants are large enough to harvest, or to be planted in soil, to allow them to root and grow to 3-5" in height, then they are sold as liners in 72 cell-packs. Using tissue culture means a sample of an endangered plant can be used to grow thousands more. If researchers develop a hybrid with curative properties, Agri-Starts can mass-produce it. ...was founded in September 1984 in Apopka, FL by Randall E. Strode and Gerri Abner. They began producing and selling tissue culture liners to the wholesale nursery industry, specializing in Alocasia, Musa, Spathiphyllum and Syngonium. Agri-Starts is committed to improving the existing technologies of today while embracing those of the future.Research strategy is driven by the global competition of producing standard crops more efficiently and new crops more frequently. Using the sciences of cold storage and UV water sterilization, a greater understanding of in vitro conditions, irradiation-induced mutations, new crop production protocols, and even knowledge of fern life cycles as tools for commercial success. Current biotech investigations at Agri-Starts, inc. are with semi-automated liquid production systems development, crop initiations through somatic embryogenesis, phytochemical production via nutraceuticals, and Agrobacterium-mediated transformation.
