Industrial Application of Biotransformations Using Plant Cell Cultures

This chapter emphasizes the characteristics of plant cell-mediated biotransformations and describes the possible techniques of yield improvement for industrial relevant processes. Glucose conjugations of exogenously added substances are considered to be detoxification reactions. Glucosylation and hydroxylation seem to be specific biotransformation reactions of higher plant cells. The enzymes for glucose conjugation or hydroxylation are not constitutive and can be inducible in some cases. Glucosyl conjugation, including glucosylation, glucosyl esterification, and hydroxylation are the most effective reactions among various biotransformations by plant cell cultures. The capability for biotransformations is diverse among plant species. Different biotransformations can be found among strains of the same species in culture. Plant cell cultures convert various substrates into diverse products with unique reactions, including regio- and stereospecific biotransformations. Culture media for plant tissue culture is relatively inexpensive compared with the culture of microorganisms or animal cells. Power consumption is not a significant barrier to biotransformation processes.