Buds

Abstract

Buds - is a documentary film produced by Sahia Film Studios in 1985, with the director Mircea POPESCU and scientific consultant Dr. Aurelia BREZEANU. The film took part a year later in the Scientific International Film Festival in Argentina, winning the highest award, respective the prize Fritzphil.

The film is a captivating documentary about the beginnings, the performances and prospects of a new field of scientific research in Romania: Plant Biotechnology. Focusing on the research team coordinated by Dr. Aurelia BREZEANU, whose activity was held in ICEBIOL (currently the Institute of Biology Bucharest of the Romanian Academy), the film presents theoretical concepts in an accessible manner, illustrated with vibrant, sensitive and memorable images. The totipotency of the plant cell, plant genome plasticity, the regeneration of the individuals from tiny and specific tissue fragments of somatic origins, somatic hybridization and embryogenesis are some scientific concepts accurately described in the documentary film that underlie the development of many biotechnological applications. The film was praised in numerous occasions, a detailed review about it being made by Cici Iordache - Abraham in the number 321/1986 in the Tribuna Romaniei journal. The author appreciated the scientific performances of the team of researchers coordinated by Dr. Aurelia BREZEANU, their work being developed at the border between fundamental and applied research. Among the results highlighted by the journalist are included: vines free of viruses, highly productive garlic varieties that are disease and weatherproof resistant, seedless watermelon, two new varieties of tobacco, improved varieties of Datura innoxia and Digitalis lanata. Several aspects were also highlighted as very important: studying the mechanisms of cell control in in vitro cultures through macro elements (calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium), or genetic determinism of plant regeneration from microspores or from somatic cells.