14 DAY TRIAL // Canadian scientists from the University of Calgary may have just found a solution to one of the most persistent problems in medicine today, and namely the availability of legal, tested painkillers. The investigators managed to successfully analyze the genome of the opioid poppy plant, the one that is currently used to produce effective drugs such as morphine and codeine. Their work raises hopes that, in the future, scientists will be able to produce these two painkillers in the laboratory, eliminating the need for raising the actual plant, and thus reducing the risks associated with it, PhysOrg reports.
In addition to this increased level of control, researchers could also in the near future become capable of controlling the way in which these compounds are expressed in the plant itself. This could easily be achieved through genetic manipulation, in very much the same way higher yields are currently being obtained from regular crops. What the Canadian team did was basically found two genes that encode for some very important enzymes, which play an important role in the painkillers.
“The enzymes encoded by these two genes have eluded plant biochemists for a half-century. In finding not only the enzymes but also the genes, we've made a major step forward. It's equivalent in finding a gene involved in cancer or other genetic disorders,” explains UC Department of Biological Sciences professor Peter Facchini. The investigator has been studying the interesting properties of opium poppy throughout his career, and is highly-qualified in understanding the impact that synthetic codeine and morphine could have in medicine. Details of the new work appear in the March 14 issue of the respected scientific journal Nature Chemical Biology.
“With this discovery, we can potentially create plants that will stop production at codeine. We are also working toward the synthesis of codeine and other opiate drugs more efficiently and economically in controlled bioprocessing facilities. Our discovery now makes it possible to use microorganisms to produce opiate drugs and other important pharmaceuticals,” the expert adds. The key genes coding for the enzymes were discovered by researcher Jillian Hagel, who was a postdoctoral researcher in Facchini's lab, and did the work as part of her PhD thesis. “That was an exciting day. We have found the missing pieces that were needed to understand how the opium poppy makes morphine," she says.