Top govt bodies enter into MoU for development of potential drugs from sea

New Delhi: The sea based organisms form a great potential as a source of drugs for many diseases that affect humans. With the increased research efforts towards harvesting this potential, the government of India too is taking many steps at the policy level.

As a latest example, the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research’s Central Drug Research Institute (CSIR-CDRI), Lucknow and Ministry of Earth Sciences, Government of India signed a Memorandum of Understanding. The MoU was exchanged by Prof. Tapas K Kundu, Director CSIR-CDRI and Dr Vipin Chandra, Joint Secretary (Admin) MoES for development of potential drugs from ocean (drugs from sea).

On this occasion, Dr Chandra said, India is endowed with a rich marine biota all along its 8000 km coastline. The Indian Ocean is the repository of a diverse and rich source of flora and fauna that have not been explored systematically for their commercial use. Though the use of marine organisms such as sponges, corals, pearl oyster, have been used the Ayurveda and Siddha medicine and are mentioned in ancient Indian texts for example “Prawal/Mukta pishti, and Prawal/Mukta bhasma“, the research to use marine products in modern medicine system are yet to be explored. He further mentioned that, the nationwide multi-centric program on “Drugs from ocean (drugs from sea)” has been initiated by the Department of Ocean Development (Ministry of Earth Sciences), New Delhi to address this area.

On this agreement signing ceremony, Director, CSIR-CDRI informed that Institute will conduct various bio assays on the samples/ fractions submitted by other pan India workers under the project for the anti-cancer, anti-inflammatory, antibacterial and antifungal activities, anti-angiogenic, stem cell differentiators and many more diseases. CSIR-CDRI shall develop/ maintain new assays as and when desired so as to do a clear bio activity profile. More over the samples, which have been identified as hits/leads, will be pursued in this plan for development of potential drugs.