Although there will still be some time before homemade heroin is available on the streets, an estimated 5.5 billion people have trouble accessing pain treatments worldwide. This is primarily due to the lack of funds. Researchers have successfully produced potent painkilling opioids with the help of bio-engineering bakers’ yeast.
https://youtu.be/r0lhgRz8IjY
THIS IS ONLY THE BEGINNING FOR THE YEAST-MADE DRUG INDUSTRY
According to the researchers, this is only the beginning, and this is one of the most “complicated chemical synthes[e]s ever engineered in yeast”. Types of opioids include codeine, methadone, heroin, morphine, and hydrocodone, and these are all sourced for the opium poppy. Twenty-three genes from various organisms such as the California poppy, goldthread herb, Iranian poppy, and the opium poppy engineered in the baker’s yeast.
YEAST-BASED DRUGS WILL MAKE DRUGS CHEAPER
In the short-term future, yeast-based opiates might lead to cheaper drugs for all. The researchers also said this method makes it easier to make painkillers in an enclosed platform. The property of hydrocodone is to shut down down pain receptors in the brain. The microbes are then redirected to create things that are not necessarily what nature intended, but nevertheless productions we very much do want. Experimental results have been minimal. To be exact, 4,400 gallons of the bioengineered yeast yields but a single dose of painkilling drugs.
IT CAN BE YEARS BEFORE THE DRUGS TO BE ON THE MARKET, IF APPROVED
The researchers say that the findings still require a lot of researcher and it could be years for the drugs to be out in the market if it is approved. After reading the instructions in the DNA, the cell will produce protein molecule that can take sugar from the environment, break it down and rebuild it into the drugs. This is also how yeast breaks down sugar and turns it into alcohol.
This similar sort of strategy might also be used to make different plant-based medicines for preventing the most cancers, infectious illnesses and perpetual sicknesses. These strains can stimulate the power of painkillers such as morphine, oxycontin and vicodin as designer drugs. It took a couple of years to tackle this problem, which stemmed from incorrect glycosylation.
