Finding new antibiotics in the soil microbiota

耐药细菌感染的增加是一个主要的全球健康威胁。这一危机因缺乏新抗生素而加剧，新抗生素的缺乏是由多种因素造成的，包括经常重新发现已知抗生素。土壤微生物群是天然产物分子的丰富来源，目前大多数临床抗菌剂都是由土壤细菌产生的。土壤微生物群中巨大的遗传多样性意味着许多新的、临床相关的天然产物无疑仍有待鉴定。然而，为了充分利用这一自然资源，需要确定有效的抗菌素并有效地减少重新发现。该项目旨在振兴抗生素管道，并指导发现新的抗生素类别。约翰英纳斯中心开发了一种有效的，高通量的管道，用于鉴定和表征生物有效的细菌天然产物。通过将抗菌药物的发现与先进的数据分析相结合，可以确保优先考虑新的途径和产品，并最大限度地减少抗生素的重新发现。该项目将利用最近研究中出现的广泛的土壤微生物分离文库和发现管道来识别和表征新的临床有效的抗菌分子。

The increase in drug-resistant bacterial infections is a major global health threat. This crisis is exacerbated by a lack of new antibiotics, caused by multiple factors including the frequent rediscovery of known antibiotics. The soil microbiota is a rich source of natural product molecules, with soil bacteria producing the majority of current clinical antimicrobials. The vast genetic diversity within the soil microbiota means that many novel, clinically relevant natural products undoubtedly remain to be identified. However, to fully exploit this natural resource efficacious antimicrobials both need to be identified and rediscovery effectively minimised. The project seeks to revitalise the antibiotic pipeline and guide the discovery of new antibiotic classes.The John Innes Centrehas developed an effective, high-throughput pipeline for the identification and characterisation of biologically effective bacterial natural products. By pairing antimicrobial discovery with advanced data analysis it is ensured that novel pathways and products are prioritised, and antibiotic rediscovery minimised. The project will exploit the extensive soil microbial isolate libraries and discovery pipeline emerging from recent research to identify and characterise new, clinically efficacious antimicrobial molecules.