Plant Systems as Platforms for the Production of Interferon Alpha and its Application

Interferon alpha (IFN) is a small glycosylated polypeptide used in the treatment of cancer, immune disorders, and various other related diseases. Demands for human and veterinary medicine in safe sources of this remedy motivate investigations for new interferon production systems. Plants expressing IFN can become an excellent substitution for traditional bacterial systems. Among the advantages of plant-based human IFN are correct glycosylation, lack of toxins and pathogens, and unexpansive production costs. The effectiveness of different plant-based systems for IFN production is compared. Oral administration of IFN produced in edible plants is a promising direction for the lack of demand for purification of the protein, its effective storage, and safe mode of the protein delivery to the competent tissues of a treated organism. The advantages of edible plants as fortified vectors for interferon delivery are discussed. Examples of oral administration of IFN from different production systems are compared. Oral usage of human IFN from various production systems in veterinary is viewed.