Since 1984 and 1988, when meetings were held on the topic of primary and secondary metabolism of plant cell cultures, there has been a clear shift of the focus of ongoing research. While the cell culture itself and the production of secondary metabolites and the biosynthetic pathways and the activity of enzymes were major topics, now these aspects are linked with genes, i.e. molecular biology becomes more prominent. This book has contributions on such subjects as fermentation, enzymology of secondary metabolism, catabolism of secondary metabolites, elicitation of pathways and genetic modification of metabolic pathways. It includes contributions on the most recent achievements in the research on among other things tropane and indole alkaloids, phenolics, (iso)flavonoids, terpenes and cardenolides. It should be a useful review of the progress made in the past years and a perspective on the future developments.
