Tracing the origin of the tobacco BY-2 cell line

One of the most frequently used plant cell lines is the tobacco cell line BY-2, which was established from Nicotiana tabacum L. cv. Bright Yellow 2 plants. However, surprisingly, after more than 50 years, the original information about the authors, the place and the method of its establishment is quite laborious to obtain. This could be important for any de novo derivation of highly proliferative cell lines. In this brief reflection article, we summarise the publicly available information on the origin of BY-2 in the 1960s, when it was used in applied research at the Central Research Institute of Japan Tobacco & Salt Public Corporation (JTS). Thanks largely to Professor Toshiyuki Nagata's activities, it spread to the rest of the world in the 1980s, becoming a cellular model for basic research into the cell cycle, membrane and cytoskeletal dynamics, and many other processes. Available literature suggests that the BY-2 cell line was derived from calli induced on the stems of seedlings of the Bright Yellow-2 Virginia-type tobacco cultivar. We hope that the information we have gathered will be useful for everyone working with, or planning to use, the BY-2 cell line. We also hope that it will encourage efforts to search for more details in old Japanese patent records that could be used to establish new, highly proliferating lines.