Secondary Metabolite Production from Plant Cell Cultures: the Success Stories of Rosmarinic Acid and Taxol

Abstract

Advances in scale-up approaches and immobilization techniques contribute to a considerable increase in the number of applications of plant cell cultures for the production of compounds with a high added value. The present review handles the cumulative progress in this field and focuses on the most recent developments regarding the in vitro production of plant-derived compounds with cancer chemotherapeutic or antioxidant properties, using ros- marinic acid (RA) and taxol as representative examples. Stimulation of biosyn- thetic pathways leads to enhanced RA accumulation in vitro. Critical issues are thoroughly discussed, including the dependence of in vitro, compound-specific production on culture growth and differentiation, elicitation strategies, physological effects of immobilization, and the current status of scale-up production systems