Bio Prospecting - Introduction

Bio prospecting or biodiversity prospecting is the exploration of microorganisms, wild plants and animals for commercially valuable genetic and bio-chemical resources.

In many cases, bio prospecting is a search for useful organic compounds in microorganisms, plants and fungi that grow in extreme environments such as rainforests, deserts and hot springs.

Humankind has been studying, manipulating and exploiting natural diversity ever since the emergence of Homo sapiens over 150,000 years ago. Our early ancestors explored biodiversity and learned how to derive benefits from nature.

Early bio prospecting led to the improvement of methods for growing food, building shelters and maintaining health. Modern-day bio prospecting is simply an extension of our long history of exploring nature to improve the quality of our life.

Most of the raw materials for biotechnology oriented industry comes from the wild rainforests of the southern hemisphere. For example, many scientists believe that the cures for AIDS, cancer and other diseases lie hidden in these green vegetation.

The main objectives of bio prospecting are to fulfill economic and conservation goals and to enhance medical and agricultural advances needed to combat disease and sustain a growing human population.  Agencies- scientific and corporates, use the folk wisdom of indigenous people to locate and understand the use of medicinal plants. Then this knowledge is commercially exploited. There needs a partnership between business men, academicians and with indigenous people to effectively utilise the ‘green gold’ (the plants and animals with properties which businesses could use for new products and services) of bio prospecting.

Academic Work and Bio Prospecting- Case of Taq Polymerase:

Dr. Thomas Brock (1966) studied microorganisms living in yellow stone’s hot springs. He named one of the curious microorganism he isolated Thermus aquaticus. This microorganism lives and thrives in water so hot that it would kill an ordinary animal. Dr. Brock grew Thermus aquaticus in the laboratory and gave a living sample to the American Type Culture Collection for safe keeping. Dr. Brock’s work was an academic one.

In 1985, a biotechnology company named Cetus Corporation was developing a new way to duplicate genetic material. Dr. Kary Mullis, working at Cetus corporation invented a way to duplicate DNA, called Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR).

But the high temperatures required by PCR destroyed the polymerase enzymes and fresh enzymes had to be added throughout the PCR process. Scientists at Cetus isolated an enzyme, named Taq polymerase, from Thermus aquaticus, which can withstand high temperatures of PCR process. PCR using Taq polymerase was so effective that a whole new scientific field has flourished as scientists finally had a convenient way to study DNA.

Thus, Dr. Brock’s academic work in Yellow stone had a practical application that he never imagined in his academic career.