Medicinal plants remain one of the most important sources of therapeutically relevant compounds for pharmaceutical, nutraceutical, and biotechnological applications. However, the naturally low abundance of many specialized metabolites, considerable phytochemical variability, and increasing environmental pressures continue to limit the sustainable exploitation of plant-derived bioactive compounds. This review summarizes current strategies aimed at identifying, understanding, and enhancing the production of medicinally valuable metabolites while highlighting both biological limitations and emerging technological opportunities. Particular attention is given to the interplay between primary and secondary metabolism and its role in determining biosynthetic efficiency in both natural and engineered systems. Beyond discussing established methodologies, this review adopts a broader perspective by incorporating less frequently addressed aspects, including the influence of climate change on metabolite production, the application of bioinformatics-supported approaches to improve bioprospecting efficiency, and the growing role of nanoparticles as elicitors in plant biotechnology. These topics are considered alongside advances in tissue culture technologies, metabolic engineering, molecular approaches, and systems-level analyses aimed at improving metabolite yield and production stability. Current evidence suggests that no single technological framework is sufficient to address the complexity of medicinal plant metabolism. Hence, rather than presenting individual technologies as isolated solutions to specific biosynthetic bottlenecks, this review emphasizes that medicinal plant metabolism should be considered a highly interconnected system in which environmental, molecular, and physiological factors collectively determine production outcomes.
Hnatuszko-Konka et al. (2026) studied this question.