Rajiv Gandhi Centre' for Biotechnology's (RGCB) Plant Biotechnology programs are directed to thrust upon spices and medicinal plants, the two important components of the rich biodiversity of Southern India. Our principal interests are to improve biotic and abiotic stress resistance in spice crops, exploit the state's rich biodiversity for obtaining pharmacologically important bioactive compounds for use in liver and gastrointestinal disease, to exploit genetic machinery of medicinal plants for improving the content of bioactive secondary metabolites and to use plant system to produce pharmaceutical products (biopharming). In spices, we focus on those segments in crop improvement where conventional methodologies can contribute little. In view of the lack of resistance source in the cultivated germplasm of ginger and black pepper for various diseases, high throughput functional genomics methods are employed to mine agronomically useful genes and promoters from their wild congeners. Real time analysis of gene expression and functional evaluation of candidate genes using gene knock-out technologies are performed to gain deeper insights into the molecular basis of physiological and biochemical processes underlying resistance response in wild relatives of these crops. In addition, modern genomic technologies are applied to understand molecular basis of abiotic stress tolerance in spices.

RGCB has a major interest in bioprospecting medicinal plants found in the rich biodiversity of the Western Ghats as well as those used in traditional tribal medicine and also those described in the classical texts of ayurveda. We use modern genomic tools to characterize the plants and then adopt bioactivity guided fractionation, molecular pharmacology and biology to study the cellular effects of the selected extracts. RGCB's major interests are in compounds that can prevent or reverse hepatic damage, have anti hepatitis B activity and in inhibiting the ulcerative action of helicobacter pylori.

We are also interested agropharming, aiming at genetically modifying suitable plant systems to scale up the biosynthesis of pharmaceuticals or to produce alien molecules of pharmaceutical importance. Currently we target polyketide synthase aiming at enhancing the content of medicinally important phenylpropanoids. A major thrust is also being given to developing transformation protocols for spices and medicinal plants.

Quantification of biodiversity in native plant species and developing their genetic fingerprints are another important area pursued by our scientists aiming at identifying distinct genotypes, providing genetic evidence for protecting intellectual property rights of the native flora and assisting raw material standardization in herbal medicine industry. DNA barcoding, the newly introduced species identification system is adopted to authenticate the herbal raw materials.

RGCB has therefore prioritized the use of modern biology in improving the quality and quantity of spices, Kerala's main cash crop and in providing a rationale scientific basis to the concepts of disease management in traditional Indian medicine. This falls in complete line of our commitment to translational biotechnology for the Indian farmer - delivery of "lab to land" technology