Open AccessComputational Tools for Discovering and Engineering Natural Product Biosynthetic Pathways
Author(s) -
Hengqian Ren,
Chengyou Shi,
Huimin Zhao
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
iscience
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.805
H-Index - 27
ISSN - 2589-0042
DOI - 10.1016/j.isci.2019.100795
Subject(s) - natural product , antifungal , computational biology , synthetic biology , biochemical engineering , genome , nanotechnology , productivity , computer science , microbiology and biotechnology , chemistry , biology , data science , biochemistry , engineering , gene , materials science , macroeconomics , economics
Natural products (NPs), also known as secondary metabolites, are produced in bacteria, fungi, and plants. NPs represent a rich source of antibacterial, antifungal, and anticancer agents. Recent advances in DNA sequencing technologies and bioinformatics unveiled natureu0027s great potential for synthesizing numerous NPs that may confer unprecedented structural and biological features. However, discovering novel bioactive NPs by genome mining remains a challenge. Moreover, even with interesting bioactivity, the low productivity of many NPs significantly limits their practical applications. Here we discuss the progress in developing bioinformatics tools for efficient discovery of bioactive NPs. In addition, we highlight computational methods for optimizing the productivity of NPs of pharmaceutical importance.
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