Microbial transformation of alkaloids.

Alkaloids continue to provide mankind with a plethora of medicines, poisons and potions. Because many valuable drugs are derived from such natural compounds, there is much interest in their transformation to provide new compounds or intermediates for the synthesis of new or improved drugs. This review aims to provide a survey of alkaloid transformations, and concerns microbial transformations and microbially expressed recombinant plant enzymes and their biotechnological applications.