Applications of Plant Metabolic Engineering [Paperback]

Written by leading international experts in the field of plant metabolic engineering, this book discusses how the technology can be applied. Applications resulting from metabolic engineering are expected to play a very important role in the future of plant breeding: for example, in the fields of improved resistance or improved traits concerning health promoting constituents, as well as in the production of fine chemicals such as medicines, flavors and fragrances.

R. VERPOORTE Division of Pharmacognosy, section Metabolomics, IBL, Leiden University PO Box 9502, 2300RA Leiden, The Netherlands, Email: VERPOORT@LACDR.LeidenUniv.NL In the past years the interest in plant secondary has increased rapidly. Three major reasons can be mentioned for this. First because plants are a major source for the production of medicines and the development of novel medicines; second because plants contain health promoting secondary metabolites, third because of the interest in the resistance of plants against pests and diseases in which the secondary metabolism plays a crucial role. Seven years ago we edited a book (Verpoorte and Alfermann 2000) on the engineering of plant secondary metabolism. A general overview was given of plant secondary metabolism, and the strategies one could envisage for engineering plant secondary metabolite pathways. Furthermore, a number of examples were presented describing the state-of-the-art of engineering plant secondary metabolism. Now we have again compiled a series of papers on the engineering of plant metabolism.1.Biosynthesis of plant natural products and characterization of plant biosynthetic pathways in recombinant microorganisms; Erin K. Marasco and Claudia Schmidt-Dannert.- 2.Plant Molecular Farming: Host Systems, Technology and Products; G.B. Sunil Kumar, T.R. Ganapathi, L. Srinivas and V.A. Bapat.- 3. Plastid Pathways, metabolic engineering via the chloroplast genome; Tracey Ruhlman and Henry Daniell.- 4.Metabolic engineering oflCÇ