Antimicrobial Efficacy of In Vitro Cultures and their Applications

Abstract

Treatment of microbial infections has become more challenging with the evolution of antibiotic resistant microbes and indiscriminate use of antibiotics. Several phytochemicals have shown potential inhibitory action against such microbes. These antimicrobials have shown their efficacy in treating such infections. These natural products also played significant role in restoration of activity of less effective antibiotics, when used in combination with antibiotics. But still, scientists are facing some major challenges in using such metabolites for medicines- there is urgent need to explore more plants showing microbial inhibition activity, plant products from field grown plants are not sufficient to meet the growing demand and purification of antimicrobial compounds, so that dosage for patients can be finalized. Tissue culture has emerged as great technology not only in the conservation of such medicinal plants but it provides major application for the production of secondary metabolites. Various micropropagules such as calli, in vitro cultures, and cell suspensions have shown their potential for the production of pharmaceutically active compounds similar to mature plants. Production of such phytochemicals can be enhanced by manipulating media supplements, culture conditions and elicitations. As, in nature production of antimicrobials is the result of interaction between the plants and microbes, therefore, such interaction can be provided to in vitro cultures by biotic elicitation. In vitro production of antimicrobial compounds has been reported in many plants such as Ricinus communis, Calendula officinalis, Abrus precatorius, etc. Thus, plant tissue culture paves an efficient and feasible method of production of such natural compounds as an alternative of antibiotics.