Engineering Cell and Organ Cultures from Medicinal and Aromatic Plants Toward Commercial Production of Bioactive Metabolites

Abstract

Production of secondary metabolites from in vitro cell and hairy root cultures (CHRC) of medicinal and aromatic plants (MAP) is considered a promising alternative to gathering plant material from MAP natural populations, often a reason for their overexploitation and even extinction. However, most of the valuable secondary metabolites extracted from different MAP species are present in very low amounts in the respective CHRC. Plant metabolic engineering offers an attractive opportunity to increase the content of target secondary metabolites in engineered transgenic CHRC for production at feasible levels. Moreover, applying metabolic engineering makes it possible to redirect target metabolic pathway K. Rusanov (*) • I.