Scientists in China have genetically modified a tobacco plant to produce two enzymes that generate cocaine in its leaves when they are dried, reports the Daily Mail.  

A team of scientists from the Kunming Institute of Botany in China have genetically altered a tobacco plant relative called Nicotiana benthamiana to produce cocaine in its leaves. Cocaine is naturally produced in the leaves of the Erythroxylum coca plant and the team of scientists have now recreated the process in Nicotiana benthamiana by altering the plant to produce the two enzymes that generate cocaine when its leaves are dried.
“It is possible to engineer different cocaine analogues for drug discovery. However, we don’t know whether we can get stimulants which have reduced psychoactive properties. My most important motivation to solve the cocaine biosynthesis question is the scientific curiosity,” lead author Dr Sheng-Xiong Huang told MailOnline.
Aside from being an illegal drug cocaine is also used in medical practices and this latest breakthrough could lead to a new way to manufacture cocaine or produce chemically similar compounds, reports the Daily Mail.
A key part of the team’s research was discovering that two enzymes, EnCYP81AN15 and EnMT4, are essential to convert the precursor chemical MPOA into a section of the cocaine molecule methylecgonone. The leaves of the tobacco plant contain omithine which is similar to MPOA and also converted by the two enzymes, reports Daily Mail. The scientists altered the plant to produce the enzymes itself and thus the plant was able to produce methylecgonone in its leaves. The modified plant produced 400 nanograms of cocaine per milligram of dried leaf which is far less than a coca plant, however the team is hopeful that its discoveries could lead to other organisms such as bacteria being modified and able to produce cocaine on a larger scale.
“At present, the available production of cocaine in tobacco is not enough to meet the demand on a mass scale,” said Sheng-Xiong Huang, co-author of the study.