Lu Xu, Tang Kexuan, Li Ping
State Key Laboratory of Natural Medicines, China Pharmaceutical University Nanjing, China.
Plant Biotechnology Research Center, School of Agriculture and Biology, Shanghai Jiao Tong University Shanghai, China.
Front Plant Sci. 2016 Nov 8;7:1647. doi: 10.3389/fpls.2016.01647. eCollection 2016.
Pharmaceutical terpenoids belong to the most diverse class of natural products. They have significant curative effects on a variety of diseases, such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, malaria and Alzheimer's disease. Nowadays, elicitors, including biotic and abiotic elicitors, are often used to activate the pathway of secondary metabolism and enhance the production of target terpenoids. Based on -mediated genetic transformation, several plant metabolic engineering strategies hold great promise to regulate the biosynthesis of pharmaceutical terpenoids. Overexpressing terpenoids biosynthesis pathway genes in homologous and ectopic plants is an effective strategy to enhance the yield of pharmaceutical terpenoids. Another strategy is to suppress the expression of competitive metabolic pathways. In addition, global regulation which includes regulating the relative transcription factors, endogenous phytohormones and primary metabolism could also markedly increase their yield. All these strategies offer great opportunities to enhance the supply of scarce terpenoids drugs, reduce the price of expensive drugs and improve people's standards of living.
药用萜类化合物属于种类最为多样的天然产物类别。它们对多种疾病具有显著疗效，如癌症、心血管疾病、疟疾和阿尔茨海默病。如今，包括生物和非生物诱导子在内的诱导子常被用于激活次生代谢途径并提高目标萜类化合物的产量。基于介导的遗传转化，几种植物代谢工程策略在调控药用萜类化合物的生物合成方面具有巨大潜力。在同源和异位植物中过表达萜类化合物生物合成途径基因是提高药用萜类化合物产量的有效策略。另一种策略是抑制竞争性代谢途径的表达。此外，包括调控相关转录因子、内源植物激素和初级代谢在内的全局调控也可显著提高其产量。所有这些策略为增加稀缺萜类药物的供应、降低昂贵药物的价格以及提高人们的生活水平提供了巨大机遇。
