Novel natural compounds obtained by genome-based screening and genetic engineering.

Despite the fact that drugs derived from natural products have revolutionized medicine in the past, they are currently going through a phase of reduced interest in drug discovery. At the same time, however, there is an urgent medical need for new drugs, since development pipelines are drying up and resistance to antibiotics and other chemotherapeutic agents is becoming an increasingly frequent problem. The development and recent progress of new technologies, such as genetic engineering and screening, offer a unique opportunity to re-establish natural products as drug leads. Examples of recent advances in the application of these technologies to the discovery and development of important novel drugs are discussed in this review.