IIT Madras, IIT Mandi researchers harness plant cells to produce anti-cancer drug

NEW DELHI: Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT Madras) and Indian Institute of Technology Mandi (IIT Mandi) researchers have discovered a method to treat cancer. The researchers from the plant cell technology lab of IIT Madras have developed a genome-scale metabolic model for N nimmoniana plant cells using Computational tools.

Highlighting the importance of this research co-investigator of the study Karthik Raman, Bhupat and Jyoti Mehta said, “This technology for model-based rational metabolic engineering of plant cells can also be used to boost the synthesis of a wide range of additional high-value phytochemicals. This research could pave the way for the commercial manufacture of camptothecin and other medicinally relevant monoterpene indole alkaloids with less reliance on nature.”

With increasing cancer incidences each day, the demand for enhanced production of anti-cancer medications has been an urgent need of the hour.

IIT Madras researchers identified a microorganism as a sustainable and high-yielding alternative source for the plant-derived anti-cancer medication camptothecin in a research paper published in 2021.

The metabolic engineering integrates with bioprocess engineering principles to ensure enhanced and sustainable production of Camptothecin.

The Science and Engineering Board (SERB) and the Department of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India, provided financial support for the research. Additionally, the peer-reviewed journal frontiers of plant science recently published this research.

Elaborating on the technical aspects of this research, the author of the research paper, Sarayu Murali, said, “The metabolic model was recreated using in-house experimental data. Computational techniques were then utilised to discover appropriate enzyme targets for overexpression and downregulation to optimise camptothecin synthesis in N nimmoniana plant cells. We experimentally validated the overexpression of an enzyme predicted by the model, which resulted in the formation of a five-fold high camptothecin-yielding cell line of N. nimmoniana in comparison to the untransformed plant cell line.”