Stable Production of the Antimalarial Drug Artemisinin in the Moss Physcomitrella patens.

ABSTRACT: Malaria is a real and constant danger to nearly half of the world's population of 7.4 billion people. In 2015, 212 million cases were reported along with 429,000 estimated deaths. The World Health Organization recommends artemisinin-based combinatorial therapies, and the artemisinin for this purpose is mainly isolated from the plant Artemisia annua. However, the plant supply of artemisinin is irregular, leading to fluctuation in prices. Here, we report the development of a simple, sustainable, and scalable production platform of artemisinin. The five genes involved in artemisinin biosynthesis were engineered into the moss Physcomitrella patens via direct in vivo assembly of multiple DNA fragments. In vivo biosynthesis of artemisinin was obtained without further

SUBMITTER: Khairul Ikram NKB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5559433 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature