Life Sciences & Biotechnology
Title : | Unraveling the Chemical Diversity of Secondary Metabolites in Medicinally Important Plants of North-Western Himalayan Region and Assessment of the Effects of Secondary Metabolites on the Metabolic Homeostasis of Cancer Cells |
Area of research : | Life Sciences & Biotechnology |
Focus area : | Natural Product Chemistry, Cancer Biology |
Principal Investigator : | Dr. Rohit Mahar, Hemwati Nandan Bahuguna Garhwal University, Uttarakhand |
Timeline Start Year : | 2023 |
Timeline End Year : | 2025 |
Contact info : | rohitmahar4u@gmail.com |
Details
Executive Summary : | Cancer continues to be one of the major causes of death globally. In the year 2022, 19.2 million cancer cases diagnosed and almost 10 million cancer patients died (International Agency for Research on Cancer, WHO), whereas the cancer cases in India for the year 2022 were found to be approximately 1.4 million. Many anticancer agents have been discovered to control the cancer prevalence but still there is an urgent need of therapies, which could provide better therapeutic output while minimizing the cost of treatment and side effects. Among the present cancer therapies, the nature has remarkably contributed to anticancer drug discovery. A number of anticancer drugs such as irinotecan, vincristine, camptothecin, and paclitaxel were originated from plants. The better connection between the binding properties of natural anticancer agents and their targets due to natural origin and chirality, makes natural products bound to complex receptors effectively. With the assistance from traditional Indian medicinal knowledge and leading-edge technology, it is possible to identify herbal formulations and subsequent isolation of potential anticancer agents. Therefore, the determination of chemical composition of herbal formulations or extracts is very important for the better understanding of mechanism of action for cancer treatment. Metabolomics provide a qualitative and quantitative overview of small molecules present in a specific cells/tissue/organism, which is unique and exciting for biomarker discovery and herbal medicines. Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR), Liquid and Gas Chromatography hyphenated with Mass Spectrometry have been used in the field of human and plant metabolomics. NMR-based metabolomics has advantages over other techniques, due to its present improved sensitivity, non-destructive nature, and parallel access to both chemical structure and quantitative information. Whereas LC-MS and GC-MS are advantageous with the resolution and separation of large number of metabolites. Identification of chemical constituents in fraction and their isolation for subsequent bioactivity evaluation are the key steps of the proposed project. The activity of fractions and purified compounds will be tested against various cancer cell lines. The perturbation in metabolic pathways and cell viability of cancer cells will be assessed, which will provide a comprehensive picture of the mechanism of action of natural products against cancer. The interdisciplinary research approach is demanded to conduct outlined research plan and perform all of the relevant research smoothly. The extensive research experience of PI in metabolite profiling of plant and biological samples and conducting in vitro therapeutic intervention studies of natural products will enable the success of the proposed project. Furthermore, the proposed project will provide a base for an in-house interdisciplinary research and open many collaborative opportunities across various institutions. |
Total Budget (INR): | 32,56,204 |
Organizations involved