HYDERABAD, Jan 19: Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences vice-chancellor Professor Jan Mohammad Memon has stressed the need for research on herbal medicines.

He was speaking as chief guest at the second three-day international symposium on biotechnology, inaugurated on Monday. The Institute of Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering, University of Sindh, has organized the symposium in collaboration with the Nuclear Institute of Agriculture, Tando Jam.

Prof Memon said Sindh was rich in medicinal plants and scientists could achieve a breakthrough by working on the plants. He said senior research scholars should provide guidance to junior researchers.

He said cancer and heart diseases were now common and medicines only provided timely relief. The director of SU's Institute of Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering, Dr Mohammad Umer Dahot, in his welcome speech said biotechnology had led to a breakthrough in human and animal health care, industrial processing, environmental biodiversity and agriculture.

He further said advances could be seen in orally-administered vegetable-based vaccines against diseases and added that human insulin, interferon synthesis in E-coli and yeast had been released for commercial use.

Dr Dahot said the recent completion of human gnome mapping was a big achievement which would open new horizons like gene therapy and elimination of genetic defects.

He said cloning of organisms was another advancement attributed to biotechnology. Nuclear Institute of Agriculture director Dr Mazhar Naqvi highlighted the progress of the institute in the field of research. In the first technical session, Prof Dr Iqbal Chaudhry delivered a talk on biotechnological approaches in natural products research.