Infectious diseases are still a major threat to public health. The vaccine remains the most important and safer way of combating infectious diseases. Therefore, there is an urgent need to look for new ways of vaccine generation that can cut down production costs and processing time. The development of rDNA technology allows the expression and purification of proteins in unlimited quantity, thus opening an avenue for the development of protein-based vaccines as a prophylactic measure against infectious diseases. Recombinant therapeutic proteins derived from biological sources, including mammalian cells, microorganisms, suspension cultures, or genetically modified organisms by employing biotechnological processes, are widely used in clinical applications, especially for the treatment and prevention of human or veterinary infections. Since the development of human insulin by utilizing recombinant DNA technology in E. coli in the 1980s, the recombinant therapeutic protein production field has significantly grown and gained major attention. Plant molecular farming, the production of biologics in plant cells or transgenic plants, could offer a cost-effective adaptable strategy to produce biologics, particularly in low-resource settings. Molecular farming-based strategies could provide an alternative strategy to traditional biologics or vaccine production, enabling rapid development, effective deployment, and safe administration of vaccines.
The concept of PMF was initially documented three decades back when recombinant growth hormone was produced in tobacco and sunflower plants. Even with such a long history of significant advantages and several proof-of-concept studies, very few plant-derived therapeutic products have been clinically translated. However, the recent progress around the approval of the plant-based biopharmaceutical ZMapp by the FDA, Medicago’s COVID-19 vaccine by Health Canada, and the safety of a few plant-derived vaccines in clinical trials have displayed the potential of a plant platform for biopharmaceutical production. Furthermore, constant efforts are being made with respect to the optimization of expression techniques, downstream processing, and defining standard guidelines for plant products to make an impact of plant-derived products on an array of applications.
The aim of this Research Topic is to provide recent advances in the field of plant molecular farming and its prospects in pharmaceutical research for developing vaccines and other biologics. Additionally, this Research Topic should facilitate the cooperation of researchers from the plant science community to exchange knowledge with the common goal to depict the feasibility of plant-produced products for commercial applications. We welcome research articles, review articles, research reports, opinions, and perspectives that address this mission. We encourage scientific contributions from both academia and industry. Manuscripts should address, but not be restricted to, the following topics:
• Utilization of plant systems to produce recombinant proteins as diagnostic reagents, vaccines, antibodies, growth factors, cytokines, receptors, etc.
• New methods or protocol optimization for high-yield protein expression in plants.
• Gene/vector design for heterologous production in plant biofactories.
• Plastid transformation and synthetic biology
• Preclinical and clinical studies using plant-derived biologics – Efficacy and safety.
• Techno-economics studies related to plant-derived products.
• Regulatory issues for plant-derived pharmaceuticals.
Infectious diseases are still a major threat to public health. The vaccine remains the most important and safer way of combating infectious diseases. Therefore, there is an urgent need to look for new ways of vaccine generation that can cut down production costs and processing time. The development of rDNA technology allows the expression and purification of proteins in unlimited quantity, thus opening an avenue for the development of protein-based vaccines as a prophylactic measure against infectious diseases. Recombinant therapeutic proteins derived from biological sources, including mammalian cells, microorganisms, suspension cultures, or genetically modified organisms by employing biotechnological processes, are widely used in clinical applications, especially for the treatment and prevention of human or veterinary infections. Since the development of human insulin by utilizing recombinant DNA technology in E. coli in the 1980s, the recombinant therapeutic protein production field has significantly grown and gained major attention. Plant molecular farming, the production of biologics in plant cells or transgenic plants, could offer a cost-effective adaptable strategy to produce biologics, particularly in low-resource settings. Molecular farming-based strategies could provide an alternative strategy to traditional biologics or vaccine production, enabling rapid development, effective deployment, and safe administration of vaccines.
The concept of PMF was initially documented three decades back when recombinant growth hormone was produced in tobacco and sunflower plants. Even with such a long history of significant advantages and several proof-of-concept studies, very few plant-derived therapeutic products have been clinically translated. However, the recent progress around the approval of the plant-based biopharmaceutical ZMapp by the FDA, Medicago’s COVID-19 vaccine by Health Canada, and the safety of a few plant-derived vaccines in clinical trials have displayed the potential of a plant platform for biopharmaceutical production. Furthermore, constant efforts are being made with respect to the optimization of expression techniques, downstream processing, and defining standard guidelines for plant products to make an impact of plant-derived products on an array of applications.
The aim of this Research Topic is to provide recent advances in the field of plant molecular farming and its prospects in pharmaceutical research for developing vaccines and other biologics. Additionally, this Research Topic should facilitate the cooperation of researchers from the plant science community to exchange knowledge with the common goal to depict the feasibility of plant-produced products for commercial applications. We welcome research articles, review articles, research reports, opinions, and perspectives that address this mission. We encourage scientific contributions from both academia and industry. Manuscripts should address, but not be restricted to, the following topics:
• Utilization of plant systems to produce recombinant proteins as diagnostic reagents, vaccines, antibodies, growth factors, cytokines, receptors, etc.
• New methods or protocol optimization for high-yield protein expression in plants.
• Gene/vector design for heterologous production in plant biofactories.
• Plastid transformation and synthetic biology
• Preclinical and clinical studies using plant-derived biologics – Efficacy and safety.
• Techno-economics studies related to plant-derived products.
• Regulatory issues for plant-derived pharmaceuticals.
