VPT 311: General and Systemic Veterinary Pharmacology (2+1)

BIOPROSPECTING 

• Refers to the search for useful applications, process or product with commercial value in the biosphere.
• It is the manipulation of nature’s bounty to find newer substances with economic importance.
• Many of the drugs in vogue today have come from traditional knowledge on the use of the plants in various biodiversity regions.
• After the discovery of penicillin, a systematic search of soil bacteria and microbes have led to the discovery of large groups of antibiotics, which are very successfully employed in the treatment of many bacterial infections in man and animals.
• Scientists are on a constant search into the deepest and farthest corners of the earth for a new product to be used as a drug for many diseases.
• Bioprospecting has its own issues and concerns. Often it leads to many new drug discoveries and treatment of diseases but the indigenous people who were instrumental are left to languish with no support and credit.
• Successful bioprospecting requires the development of a sustainable model in which a benefit sharing system is evolved among industries, ecosystem and the projected communities.
• Cure for many a dreaded diseases must be hidden in the remotest forests, deep oceans and highest mountains and bioprospecting is an instrument to uncover such new knowledge.
• When performed in a large-scale operation, the effort is referred to as mass bioprospecting.
• Experiences from the mass bioprospecting efforts demonstrate that mass bioprospecting is a complex process, involving expertise from diverse areas of human endeavors, what is important is the recognition of issues on genetic access, prior informed consent, intellectual property and the sharing of benefits that may arise as a result of the effort.
• Future mass bioprospecting endeavors must take heed of the lessons learned from past and present experiences in the planning for a successful mass bioprospecting venture.