PLANT CELL CULTURE: AN ALTERNATIVE FOR PRODUCTION OF SECONDARY METABOLITES

Research in the area of 'Plant Cell Culture' technology has resulted in the production of many pharmaceutical substances for new therapeutics. Advances in the area of cell culture for the production of medicinal compounds have made possible the production of a wide variety of pharmaceuticals like alkaloids, terpenoids, steroids, saponins, phenolics, flavonoids and amino acids. During the past two decades, a considerable progress has been made to stimulate formation and accumulation of secondary metabolites using plant cell culture. This book, therefore describes new protocols for development of cell culture of medicinal plants and qualitative as well as quantitative estimation of secondary metabolites from culture thereof. It also highlights effect of elicitation treatment on production of secondary metabolites and pharmacological screening of same with various in- vitro and animal models.