Target-directed discovery and production of pharmaceuticals in transgenic mutant plant cells.

ABSTRACT: Plants are a source of complex bioactive compounds, with value as pharmaceuticals, or leads for synthetic modification. Many of these secondary metabolites have evolved as defenses against competing organisms and their pharmaceutical value is "accidental", resulting from homology between target proteins in these competitors, and human molecular therapeutic targets. Here we show that it is possible to use mutation and selection of plant cells to re-direct their "evolution" toward metabolites that interact with the therapeutic target proteins themselves. This is achieved by expressing the human target protein in plant cells, and selecting mutants for survival based on the interaction of their metabolome with this target. This report describes the successful evolution of hairy root cultures o

SUBMITTER: Brown DP 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5242497 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature