Promotion of artemisinin content in Artemisia annua by overexpression of multiple artemisinin biosynthetic pathway genes

Artemisinin, isolated from an annual herbaceous plant Artemisia annua L., is an effective antimalarial compound. However, artemisinin is accumulated in small amounts (0.01–0.1% leaf dry weight) in A. annua, resulting in constant high artemisinin price. Although metabolic engineering of partial artemisinin metabolic pathway in yeast achieved great success, artemisinin from A. annua is still the important business resource. Here, we report on the generation of transgenic plants with simultaneously overexpressing four artemisinin biosynthetic pathway genes, amorpha-4,11-diene synthase gene (ADS), amorpha-4,11-diene 12-monooxygenase gene (CYP71AV1), cytochrome P450 reductase gene (CPR), and aldehyde dehydrogenase 1 gene (ALDH1) via Agrobacterium-mediated transformation. The qRT-PCR analysis demonstrated that the introduced four genes of the transgenic lines were all highly expressed. Through high-performance liquid chromatography analysis, the artemisinin contents were increased markedly in transformants, with the highest being 3.4-fold higher compared with non-converter. These results indicate that overexpression of multiple artemisinin biosynthetic pathway genes is a promising approach to improve artemisinin yield in A. annua.