ABSTRACT
Globally, scientists are developing vaccines which will be produced by edible plants and then be consumed by human beings in need of such vaccine. The plants are genetically engineered to carry genes from disease-causing microbes. Much work on plant derived vaccines (PDVs) has been done taking potatoes, rice, tomatoes, tobacco, banana, etc., as experimental material. Tobacco cannot be eaten and potatoes must be cooked before consumption, which in most cases destroys the medicinal properties of the vaccine. As an initial step toward provision of an oral vaccine against the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV), Hong-Ye Li and Mee-Len Chye have expressed a partial spike (S) protein of SARS-CoV in the cytosol of nuclear-transformed plants and in the chloroplasts of plastid-transformed plants. Dow AgroSciences has won the first Federal approval of a plant-made vaccine, the product of a laboratory process that avoids the controversial use of pharmaceutical field crops.
