"I have been sick for 3 years, taking medicine for 40000 yuan per bottle for 3 years, losing my house and my family." A passage from the movie "I am not the God of Medicine" made many people cry, and behind the unaffordable "life-saving drugs" is the monopoly of European and American pharmaceutical companies on patented technology. How to enable more people to take "cheaper and more effective" life-saving drugs? Independent research and development is crucial. In order to solve the bottleneck problem of the biosynthesis of paclitaxel, a "star anti-cancer drug", and break foreign technological monopolies, the Shenzhen Institute of Agricultural Genomics of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (Shenzhen Branch of Lingnan Modern Agricultural Science and Technology Guangdong Provincial Laboratory), in collaboration with six domestic and foreign units such as Peking University and Tsinghua University, has carried out technological research and development. It has taken the lead in achieving the biosynthesis of paclitaxel internationally and is expected to solve the problem of "star anti-cancer drugs" The problem of insufficient supply of paclitaxel. Not long ago, the international academic journal Science published online the latest research results jointly completed by researcher Yan Jianbin and Professor Lei Xiaoguang, discovering two missing key enzymes in the biosynthesis pathway of paclitaxel, elucidating the formation mechanism of the key structural molecule - paclitaxel oxycyclohexane, and opening up the biosynthesis pathway of paclitaxel. This research achievement marks China's position as a world leader in the theory and technology of paclitaxel synthesis biology. The star anticancer drug paclitaxel exists in nature as a type of natural product drug, widely used in cancer treatment, prevention of cardiovascular diseases, etc., and paclitaxel is one of them. As a highly effective, low toxic, broad-spectrum natural anti-cancer drug, paclitaxel is known as a "star anti-cancer drug" because of its remarkable efficacy and wide use, and is widely used in the clinical treatment of breast cancer cancer, ovarian cancer, lung cancer, prostate cancer, esophageal cancer, gastric cancer, colorectal cancer and other cancers. However, the natural source of paclitaxel is scarce and single, and can only be extracted from the rare and endangered gymnosperm plant Taxus chinensis. However, Taxus chinensis grows slowly and is extremely rare, earning it the nickname of the "plant giant panda". Not only that, the content of paclitaxel in the yew plant is extremely low, and only about 1 kilogram of paclitaxel can be extracted from thousands of yew trees. To treat an ovarian cancer patient, more than ten hundred year old yew trees are needed. So, how to achieve the biosynthesis of paclitaxel without relying on taxus? This is a difficult problem facing scientists around the world. Since the 1980s, scientists have been searching for a synthetic method that can replace natural extraction of paclitaxel. In 1990, the United States was the first to develop a semi synthetic route for paclitaxel and quickly put it into commercial production. Over the next 30 years, hundreds of research teams around the world have successively invested in the biological total synthesis of paclitaxel, but none of them have achieved breakthroughs. Zhao Guoping, an academician of the CAS Member, believes that paclitaxel is the most effective anti-cancer natural product drug developed by human beings so far, and its extremely complex chemical structure determines the unprecedented difficulty in parsing the biosynthetic pathway. After years of exploration, the team led by Yan Jianbin from the Shenzhen Institute of Agricultural Genomics, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, has solved this world-class problem and found a green and sustainable path that does not require the consumption of natural yew resources and does not rely on soil cultivation
Edit：GuoGuo Responsible editor：FangZhiYou
Source：chinanews.com
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