Natural product discovery through microbial genome mining.

Natural product discovery through microbial genome mining.
Curr Opin Chem Biol. 2020 Aug 24;60:47-54
Authors: Kenshole E, Herisse M, Michael M, Pidot SJ
Abstract
The advent of the genomic era has opened up enormous possibilities for the discovery of new natural products. Also known as specialized metabolites, these compounds produced by bacteria, fungi, and plants have long been sought for their bioactive properties. Innovations in both DNA sequencing technologies and bioinformatics now allow the wealth of sequence data to be mined at both the genome and metagenome levels for new specialized metabolites. However, a key problem that remains is rapidly and efficiently linking these identified genes to their corresponding compounds. Within this review, we provide specific examples of studies that have used the power of genomic or metagenomic data to overcome these problems and identify new small molecules and their biosynthetic pathways.
PMID: 32853968 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

Source: Current Opinion in Chemical Biology - August 23, 2020 Category: Biochemistry Authors: Kenshole E, Herisse M, Michael M, Pidot SJ Tags: Curr Opin Chem Biol Source Type: research