Taxol from Pestalotiopsis pauciseta VM1, an endophytic fungus of Tabebuia pentaphylla

Taxol is the world's first billion-dollar anticancer drug, and it is used to treat ovarian, breast, lung as well as head and neck cancers. The purpose of this work was to identify a taxol-producing endophytic fungus Pestalotiopsis pauciseta VM1 isolated from Tabebuia pentaphylla Hemsl. by morphological and molecular method. Pestalotiopsis pauciseta VM1 produced taxol, when grown in M1D medium and analysed by Thin Layer Chromatography (TLC), High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC), Ultraviolet (UV), Infrared (IR) Spectroscopy and Mass Spectroscopy (MS).