BIOTECHNOLOGICAL PRODUCTION OF TAXOL

The extraction of taxol from natural sources and the semi- synthetic production of taxol have been so
challenging but several efforts have been made to produce large amount of taxol using cell cultures.
Since the early 1990s, biotechnological production of taxol has being studied and observed.

Exposito and his colleagues optimized the culture conditions by assaying several basic media.
Mirjalili and his co- workers investigated the effect of oxygen combination and concentration, carbon
dioxide and ethylene on cell growth and the production of taxol in cell suspension cultures of T.
cuspidata. Their study shows that at high osmotic conditions introduced by mannitol, sorbitol and
polyethylene glycol lead to an increase in the production of taxol. Ciddi et al adopted methyl
jasmonate as an elicitor at late exponential growth phase of T. chinensis cell suspension cultures
demonstrating an increase in taxoid production in cell culture. It was suggested that methyl jasmonate
acts as signal compounds in elucidating process resulting into transcription and translation of gene de
novo. Genetic transformation of T. baccata and T. brevifolia using Agrobacterium tumefecians is
reported. It was reported that B0542 strain of Agrobacterium is more efficient in galls induction of
mature yew tree shoot segments than C58 strains. Untransformed cells however, was reported has
proliferated gall cell lines on phyto-hormone free medium.