Research Institute for Scientists Emeriti (R.I.S.E.), Drew University, Madison, NJ, 07940, USA,
J Ind Microbiol Biotechnol. 2014 Feb;41(2):185-201. doi: 10.1007/s10295-013-1325-z. Epub 2013 Aug 30.
Microbes are the leading producers of useful natural products. Natural products from microbes and plants make excellent drugs. Significant portions of the microbial genomes are devoted to production of these useful secondary metabolites. A single microbe can make a number of secondary metabolites, as high as 50 compounds. The most useful products include antibiotics, anticancer agents, immunosuppressants, but products for many other applications, e.g., antivirals, anthelmintics, enzyme inhibitors, nutraceuticals, polymers, surfactants, bioherbicides, and vaccines have been commercialized. Unfortunately, due to the decrease in natural product discovery efforts, drug discovery has decreased in the past 20 years. The reasons include excessive costs for clinical trials, too short a window before the products become generics, difficulty in discovery of antibiotics against resistant organisms, and short treatment times by patients for products such as antibiotics. Despite these difficulties, technology to discover new drugs has advanced, e.g., combinatorial chemistry of natural product scaffolds, discoveries in biodiversity, genome mining, and systems biology. Of great help would be government extension of the time before products become generic.
微生物是有用天然产物的主要生产者。微生物和植物来源的天然产物可制成极好的药物。大量微生物基因组用于生产这些有用的次级代谢产物。一种微生物可以产生多种次级代谢产物，高达 50 种化合物。最有用的产品包括抗生素、抗癌剂、免疫抑制剂，但许多其他用途的产品，如抗病毒剂、驱虫剂、酶抑制剂、营养保健品、聚合物、表面活性剂、生物除草剂和疫苗已经商业化。不幸的是，由于天然产物发现工作的减少，过去 20 年药物发现有所减少。原因包括临床试验成本过高、产品成为仿制药之前的窗口期过短、发现针对耐药生物的抗生素困难，以及抗生素等产品的患者治疗时间短。尽管存在这些困难，但发现新药的技术已经取得进展，例如天然产物支架的组合化学、生物多样性的发现、基因组挖掘和系统生物学。政府延长产品成为仿制药之前的时间将大有帮助。
