Department of Biochemistry & Biophysics, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, United States.
Department of Biochemistry & Biophysics, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, United States.
Curr Opin Microbiol. 2019 Oct;51:64-71. doi: 10.1016/j.mib.2019.06.006. Epub 2019 Jul 22.
Microorganisms produce biologically active natural products, some of which are useful as antibiotics and other medicines. A great demand for new antibiotics exists due to the diversity of pathogens and their mechanisms of drug resistance. Antibiotics were discovered as natural metabolites that enable a microorganism to suppress the growth of a competitor. Although the pace of discovery has slowed dramatically, new approaches to identifying antibiotics show promise for the future. Among many modern approaches to discovery, co-culturing different species and understanding the molecular bases of their interactions is opening new windows to antibiotic discovery. Here we review several examples to illustrate how co-culturing as an approach is producing new insights into the biology of specialized metabolism. Understanding the varied functions of specialized metabolites, combined with use of innovative and advanced analytical tools, indicates that studies of microbial interactions will enhance the discovery of new antibiotics and other natural products.
微生物产生具有生物活性的天然产物，其中一些可用作抗生素和其他药物。由于病原体的多样性及其耐药机制，对抗生素的需求很大。抗生素是作为天然代谢物被发现的，这些代谢物使微生物能够抑制竞争对手的生长。尽管发现的步伐已经大大放缓，但识别抗生素的新方法为未来带来了希望。在发现的众多现代方法中，共培养不同物种并了解它们相互作用的分子基础正在为抗生素的发现开辟新的途径。在这里，我们回顾了几个例子来说明共培养作为一种方法如何为专门代谢物的生物学提供新的见解。了解特殊代谢物的各种功能，结合使用创新和先进的分析工具，表明对微生物相互作用的研究将增强对抗生素和其他天然产物的新发现。
