Scientists develop tomato genetically enriched with Parkinson’s disease drug

News

Author: Johanna Stiefler JohnsonPublished: 17 December 2020

Parkinson's LifePrep: Parkinson's LifeCook: Parkinson's LifeServes:

Researchers in the UK have succeeded in genetically modifying a tomato with a common Parkinson’s disease drug.

As part of the study, the researchers inserted a gene encoding the enzyme tyrosinase into a tomato to elevate levels of the Parkinson’s drug. The aim of this research is to create a more cost-effective production pipeline, wherein the Parkinson’s drug is extracted from enriched tomatoes and purified into the pharmaceutical product. Their findings could positively impact people with Parkinson’s who have restricted access to pharmaceutical drugs, providing a more affordable source of the treatment.

Dr Dario Breitel, the research study’s first author, says: “We have demonstrated that the use of tyrosinase-expressing tomatoes as a source of [the Parkinson’s drug] is possible. It’s a further demonstration of tomato as a strong option for synthetic biology. Additionally, there were surprising beneficial effects including improvement in shelf-life and raised levels of amino-acids that we can investigate.”

Image credit: Phil Robinson, John Innes Centre.


Read more:

A new technique for isolating brain cells linked to Parkinson’s

Diagnosing Parkinson’s disease with “a simple picture of the eye”

Go Back

Share this story

Comments


Related articles


Sue-Wylie-kickstarter-lead

Europe

Parkinson’s playwright: why I’m raising £20,000 to make an educational film

Parkinson’s play ‘Kinetics’ launches Kickstarter campaign

READ MORE

Global update

Dave Clark: “I’ve decided to donate my brain to the Parkinson’s UK Brain Bank”

Sports commentator Dave Clark announces plans to donate his brain to the wo

READ MORE
Lucilla-Bossi

Global update

Campaigners living with Parkinson’s invited to apply for US$20,000 award

2015 Bakken Invitation Award open for entries

READ MORE