In a move that could inspire more studies and eventual treatment researchers have been able to decode the Tulsi plant. Indian scientists have made an interesting breakthrough towards understanding the medicinal value of the famous Queen of herbs Tulsi.
(Tulsi Biological Name: Ocimum tenuiflorum)
Participants
–Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â A multi-institutional team 25 scientists from various organizations such as inStem, NCBS and CCAMP.
–Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Team led by Sowdhamini Ramanathan from the National Centre of Biological Science, Bengaluru.
Findings
–        Tulsi plant has about 40 special chemicals that have medicinal values.
–        Revisit of age-old knowledge of the plant, its medicinal effects helps in decoding of the plant and found the genes responsible for production of compounds with potential medicinal properties.
–        It also revealed interesting ways about how the plant makes a chemical called Ursolic acid.
Tulsi Applications
–Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Tulsi known for its anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, anti-pyretic properties is considered to be of Indian origin and has been under cultivation for almost 3000 years now.
–Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â It is also used as an anti-cancer cure.
About Genome
–        The term was created in 1920 by Hans Winkler.
–Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Genome is the genetic material of an organism.
–Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Genome consists of DNA (or RNA in RNA viruses). It includes both the genes and the non-coding sequences of the DNA/RNA