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Production of pharmaceutical compounds |
| Twentyfive percent of prescription-drugs used in the western world originate from plants. As conventional growing of medicinal plants is relatively expensive, it was hoped that production of pharmaceuticals in cell cultures under controlled conditions would be a viable alternative. Unfortunately, secondary metabolites are often not produced in cell culture and not in sufficient levels to make the production commercially viable, except in a few cases. Drug compounds that have been produced in cell or organ culture include: diosgenin, codeine, morphine, atropine, hyoscyamine, scopolamine, digoxin, digitoxin, quinine, reserpine, artemisinin and taxol. |  |
| An example where cell cultures may be usefull is in the production of Paclitaxel (taxol). Paclitaxel is used to treat ovarian and breast cancer. The compound is extracted from the bark of a small tree, Taxus baccata. Paclitaxel is very difficult to synthetize as it has 10 stereocenters, and the natural populations of T. baccata cannot deliver enough of the drug, so an alternative source must be found. The table gives production rates from trees, cell and fungal culture (a fungus that lives on the tree and also produces paclitaxel). It is seen that the cell culture can produce higher rates of paclitaxel and could become a viable way of production. |
Production of Paclitaxel in trees, cell and fungal cultures.
|
Plant material |
Specific biosynthetic rate |
Average paclitaxel content |
|
Bark of mature tree |
4.70 x 10-6 mg/g/day |
0.017 |
|
Taxus plantation |
0.34 x 10-6 mg/g/day |
0.005 |
|
Taxus tissue culture |
0.64 mg/l/day |
0.200 |
|
Taxomyces andreanae |
400 x 10-6 mg/l/day |
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