Abstract
Actinomycetes are an incredibly prolific source of therapeutic secondary metabolites. Indeed, over 50% of currently used commercial antibiotics are of actinomycetal origin. However, discovery has slowed significantly since the so-called golden age of antibiotics in the 1940s-1960s. The expansion of genome sequencing has revealed many more undiscovered natural products which are often cryptic, or not produced under standard laboratory conditions due to their finely tuned ecological roles in their natural contexts. Advances in synthetic biology approaches have revealed new strategies to manipulate actinomycetes and perform screens to uncover some of these cryptic natural products. Additionally, such strategies provide the tools to generate analogs of natural products through manipulation of precursor flux and biosynthetic enzymes.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Natural Products from Actinomycetes |
Subtitle of host publication | Diversity, Ecology and Drug Discovery |
Publisher | Springer Nature |
Pages | 267-307 |
Number of pages | 41 |
ISBN (Electronic) | 9789811661327 |
ISBN (Print) | 9789811661310 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Apr 15 2022 |
Externally published | Yes |
Keywords
- Cryptic natural products
- Heterologous expression
- Streptomyces
- Synthetic biology