Karnataka - Gulbarga   

Plants with fertility regulators discovered

By Our Special Correspondent

GULBARGA, JULY 18. The joint research conducted by Gulbarga University and Sunderland University in the United Kingdom has discovered that many plants available in the region have good fertility regulating agents that cause little side effects.

M.G. Purohit of the Pharmaceutical Chemistry Division, Department of Chemistry, Gulbarga University, told The Hindu here today that the seeds of a common vegetable had been identified as the best agent to control fertility, and that research scholars and scientists of both universities were researching its benefits.

Mr. Purohit said that the man behind the collaboration, Malcolm Hooper, had retired and W.J. Lough had taken over the project. The collaboration had aimed to help tropical countries solve health-related problems, and the research project to identify natural agents for fertility regulation was launched in 1992.

In addition to identifying natural products for fertility regulation, research was also carried out with funding from the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) to identify plants that helped in treating gastric ulcers. Research scholars had been successful in identifying a local plant and Gulbarga University had signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the Indian Institute of Chemical Technology, Hyderabad, for conducting further tests and patenting the product.

He said the research had attracted the attention of some of the leading pharmaceutical companies and the England-based Stiefel Laboratories was funding a research programme on "Evaluation of Plants indigenous to Shimoga, Gulbarga, and Sundur regions of Karnataka for activity against skin diseases."

The successful research programme had impressed many funding agencies and multinational companies, and the Wellcome Trust had evinced interest in funding research on natural products. The department would send a proposal for the project shortly, he said. The British Council in Mumbai had also recommended Gulbarga University to the Association of Commonwealth Universities in London for the award of Split-Site Ph.D. fellowships to its research students.

The programme would give Ph.D. scholars of Gulbarga University the opportunity to apply for a one-year fellowship for continuing research at University of Sunderland on completing two years of research in India.

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