Withania somnifera (L.) Dunal known as Ashwagandha is commonly used in traditional Indian medicine system. It possesses immense therapeutic value against a large number of ailments such as mental diseases, asthma, inflammation, arthritis, rheumatism, tuberculosis, and a variety of other diseases including cancer. The therapeutic potential of W. somnifera is due to the presence of secondary meta...

In the biosynthesis of tropane alkaloids, two tropinone reductases (TRs) catalyze reduction of tropinone to different stereoisomers, tropine and pseudotropine. Two TRs from Hyoscyamus niger have 64% of identical amino acids and hence a common evolutionary origin. In this study, genomic clones of TRs were isolated from H. niger. Their sequence comparison showed that although they have the same e...

Hyoscyamine, anisodamine and scopolamine are tropane alkaloids present in some Solanaceae species used modern medicine. L-Hyoscyamine is hydroxylated to 6β-hydroxyhyoscyamine (anisodamine) then epoxidated by the dual action of hyoscyamine 6β-hydroxylase (H6H), a 2-oxoglutarate dependent dioxygenase. A natural mutation Gly-220 residue Cys was previously shown be associated with loss function H6H...

Planar chromatography is a very useful tool for analysis of wide range of different mixtures. Thanks to its possibility for rapid separation of large number of samples simultaneously, low solvent consumption and ability to analyse rough material allow to receive precise and reliable results in short time and low cost. Miniaturization of planar techniques brings a lot of advantages, such as shor...

Thorn Apple or Jimson Weed (Datura stramonium) is a tropane alkaloid containing widespread pest plant growing in central Europe. This predominantly occurs millet, buckwheat and maize cultivation. Therefore, sound cleaning of these crops just as pivotal reliable analytics. The millet at laboratory scale with commercial mechanical devices, such sieves, indented separators table sorters without us...

The transmission of insect-borne viruses involves sophisticated interactions between viruses, host plants, and vectors. Chemical compounds play an important role in these interactions. Several studies reported that the plant virus tomato spotted wilt orthotospovirus (TSWV) increases quality for its vector benefits thrips Frankliniella occidentalis. However, few have investigated chemical ecolog...

Agrobacterium rhizogenes (pRi), a causative agent of hairy root disease, effectively induces hairy root formation in a variety of plant species. In our study four bacterial strains AR15834, A4, 9435 and C318 and three explants types leaf, stems and roots, were examined. Hairy roots were induced from roots, stems and leaf explants. The highest transformation efficiency of 77% was achieved by usi...