Metabolic engineering of plant secondary metabolite pathways for the production of fine chemicals

The technology of large-scale plant cell culture is feasible for the indust rial production of plant-derived fine chemicals. Due to low or no productiv ity of the desired compounds the economy is only in a few cases favorable. Various approaches are studied to increase yields, these encompass screenin g and selection of high producing cell lines, media optimization, elicitati on, culturing of differentiated cells (organ cultures), immobilization. In recent years metabolic engineering has opened a new promising perspectives for improved production in a plant or plant cell culture.