Taxane production induced by methyl jasmonate in free and immobilized cell cultures of Mexican yew (Taxus globosa Schltdl)

Taxus globosa Schltdl, the Mexican yew, represents a new source of taxanes, including taxol, baccatin III, 10-deacetylbaccatin III, 10-deacetyltaxol and cephalomannine. Due to the anticancer activity and other biological activities of these compounds, and their scarcity in nature, we initiated in vitro cultures of this species with the aim of developing a biotechnological process for obtaining taxol and related taxanes. In the current work, in a batch-type two-phase culture of T. globosa, we evaluated the effect of cell immobilization and methyl jasmonate (MeJ) elicitation in two culture media containing different plant growth regulator combinations: 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic + benzylaminopurine (Treatment 1: T1) and picloram + kinetin (Treatment 2: T2). The productivity and excretion rate into the culture medium of baccatin III (12.79 μg L−1 d−1) (84 %), 10-deacetylbaccatin III (15 μg L−1 d−1) (0 %), 10-deacetyltaxol (3.18 μg L−1 d−1) (63 %), and cephalomannine (49.27 μg L−1 d−1) (9 %) were increased by the effect of T1 in the free cell cultures elicited with MeJ. Cell immobilization in alginate beads did not improve the biotechnological production of these four taxanes. In contrast, the highest productivity of taxol (53 μg L−1 d−1) was achieved in MeJ-elicited free cells under T2 and cell immobilization in these conditions increased productivity by more than twofold (130.35 μg L−1 d−1).