Many natural products have applications either directly or indirectly as pharmaceuticals, such as antibacterials, antifungals or anticancers; however, there remains a need for pharmaceuticals that target infections and cancers more specifically. For decades most discovery efforts have focused on bacteria, while fungi have been comparatively under investigated. This lack of effort persists despite the obvious chemical potential of some fungal species; for example Aspergillus nidulans, a representative fungal species, possesses nearly fifty annotated secondary metabolism gene. Yet only six of these clusters have associated natural products.In an effort to access their untapped chemical potential, marine fungi are treated with chemicals known to disrupt epigenetic markers, and thus misregulate gene expression. These treatments and a combination metabolomics and proteomics allows for discovery and characterization of new natural products from marine fungi that are otherwise silent under normal growth conditions.

Inducing production of cryptic natural products in fungi

246th National Meeting (2013)

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