MUMBAI, India, Nov. 7 -- Intellectual Property India has published a patent application (202431035258 A) filed by University Of Engineering And Management, Kolkata, West Bengal, on May 3, 2024, for 'formulation of a plant based organic herbal bio-weedicide.'
Inventor(s) include Dr. Pratik Talukder; Ms. Baishakhi Sinha; Ms. Meghna Mishra; Ms. Arundhuti Mukherjee; and Ms. Suravi Dutta.
The application for the patent was published on Nov. 7, under issue no. 45/2025.
According to the abstract released by the Intellectual Property India: "With increase in world population and sensitivity of plants to various environmental stressors which results in reduced plant vigor, there emerges a pressing need for effective crop management. To ensure consistent yield of high quality and nutritional crops, sufficient measures and precautions must be undertaken to combat the greatest peril of the plant kingdom: weed infestation. Solanum melongena, a vegetable belonging to the Solanaceae family is frequently cultivated in the tropical and subtropical areas particularly in Asia (India, China, Bangladesh and the southeastern regions) and collaterally in the Middle East and in the vicinity of the Mediterranean. However the cultivation rates of Solanum melongena has significantly been reduced due to weed activity. Two most common weeds known to affect Solanum melongena are Lantana camara and Parthenium hysterophorus. Lantana camara, an exotic weed from the Verbenaceae family, introduced from America, has an exceptional rate of fanning out to neighboring plants thereby affecting the latter's metabolite production. On the other hand, Parthenium hysterophorus belonging to the Asteraceae family also native to America, operates similarly to minimize the endurance of plants by reducing secondary metabolites production. For its notorious effects, in India alone, Parthenium hysterophorus is infamously called the 'Terror of Bengal'. Amensalism is the phenomenon which causes this reduction. In addition, it inhibits the growth of plant seedlings thereby resulting in subsequent reduction in yield. Although Solanum melongena exhibits sensitivity to the aforementioned weed activities, the experimental results obtained from this study has disclosed the plant's ability to endure and survive the degrading effects of weed allelochemicals. This paper poignantly shows the role played by Chlorogenic Acid (CGA) in combating the weed infestation of Solanum melongena. CGA, a notable polyphenol, is renowned for its role in plant defense mechanisms as it has antioxidant activity and also functions as anti-lipidemic, anti-diabetic and anti-inflammatory agent. The synthesis of CGA by the Phenylpropanoid Pathway is regulated by the expression of Hydroxycinnamoyl CoA quinate transferase (HQT) gene. To further confirm the CGA levels of affected sample plant Solanum melongena, the expression of Phenyl Alanine Lyase (PAL) gene, the first enzyme of the Phenylpropanoid Pathway, was also analyzed in this study. Economic drawbacks of weed infestation are a major issue of agricultural processes as it leads to reduced growth and vitality of crops. The results obtained from this study paves the way for a cost-effective development of efficient weedicide with the goal of maintaining superficial quality of plants thus adding a new dimension to the aegis of the crop management industry."
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