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UC Berkeley researchers identified the genes involved in the artemisinic acid biosynthetic pathway in the wormwood plant, Artemisia annua. Using their expertise in synthetic biology, they engineered the biosynthetic pathway to manufacture the direct precursor to artemisinin. Optimization of artemisinic acid production in these host cells is being achieved through cutting-edge techniques in metabolic engineering, in collaboration with scientists at Amyris.
Amyris will optimize the semisynthetic artemisinin microbial host developed with UC Berkeley. In addition, Amyris will develop the initial fermentation and purification manufacturing processes and a scalable, inexpensive chemical process to convert the precursor to artemisinin.
Sanofi-aventis has joined this collaborative effort to provide fermentation and chemistry process development expertise. If technical milestones are achieved, Sanofi-aventis will commercialize semisynthetic artemisinin and develop an industrial manufacturing process.
OneWorld Health has responsibility for directing this collaborative effort, and the achievement of public policy and global access goals. It is iOWH's role to apply and reinforce WHO sanctioned Global Health goals to the development program and to ensure that the project goals of producing a low-cost, supplementary source of high quality artemisinin are met.
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