Chinese yeast factory boosts cancer drug production speed 1,000 times
A research team at Zhejiang University has cracked a molecular puzzle, turning ordinary yeast into a powerful factory for an expensive cancer drug and boosting its production by a thousand times. The anticancer drug vinblastine has long been sourced exclusively from the Madagascar periwinkle plant. But it takes 2 tonnes of dried leaves to yield just 1 gram of vinblastine, making it more expensive…
A research team at Zhejiang University has engineered yeast to produce vinblastine, an expensive anticancer drug, at a rate 1,000 times higher than previously possible. Vinblastine is currently sourced exclusively from the Madagascar periwinkle plant, which requires large quantities to yield only small amounts of the drug. The team, led by professor Lian Jiazhang, collaborated with researchers from the University of New Brunswick in Canada and Westlake University in China.
They inserted a 30-step synthesis pathway for vinblastine into yeast cells. However, the output was initially limited due to an unstable intermediate in the pathway. The breakthrough came with the discovery of a gene called CAD2, which encodes a protein dubbed VinBLAST. VinBLAST acts as a molecular bridge, connecting upstream and downstream enzymes and accelerating the reaction, resulting in the production of 164.9 milligrams of catharanthine – the precursor to vinblastine – per liter in the fermenter.
This represents a thousandfold increase over previous records. The system could potentially be used to produce other important medicines, making life-saving drugs more accessible and affordable.
Written by urgent.news from Reuters Business via SCMP's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
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