Drugs from the deep: Marine natural products as drug candidates
Abstract
In recent years, marine natural product bioprospecting has yielded a considerable number of drug candidates. Most of these molecules are still in preclinical or early clinical development but some are already on the market, such as cytarabine, or are predicted to be approved soon, such as ET743 (Yondelis). Research into the ecology of marine natural products has shown that many of these compounds function as chemical weapons and have evolved into highly potent inhibitors of physiological processes in the prey, predators or competitors of the marine organisms that use them. Some of the natural products isolated from marine invertebrates have been shown to be, or are suspected to be, of microbial origin and this is now thought to be the case for the majority of such molecules. Marine microorganisms, whose immense genetic and biochemical diversity is only beginning to be appreciated, look likely to become a rich source of novel chemical entities for the discovery of more effective drugs.
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The bio-active molecules impact has been evaluated against various cancer types in clinical trials.
“The bio-active molecules impact has been evaluated against various cancer types in clinical trials [41,42,43,44,45].”
From Marine Natural Products: A Source of Novel Anticancer Drugs (2019) · cites this paper as [42]
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- Authors
- Haefner, B.
- Affiliations
- Janssen (Belgium) (BE)
- Corresponding author
- Haefner, Burkhard
- Venue
- Drug Discovery Today
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2003-06
- Volume
- 8
- Issue
- 12
- Pages
- 536-544
- ISSN
- 1359-6446 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2032574998
- Cited by
- 740
- References
- 68
- Citations by year
- 2026: 10 · 2025: 17 · 2024: 22 · 2023: 31 · 2022: 29 · 2021: 38 · 2020: 40 · 2019: 40 · 2018: 41 · 2017: 43 · 2016: 49 · 2015: 45 · 2014: 45 · 2013: 37 · 2012: 42
- FWCI
- 2.67
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Drug Discovery Today (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Biotechnology › Marine Sponges and Natural Products
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Pharmacology › Microbial Natural Products and Biosynthesis
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Cancer Research › Synthesis and Biological Activity
- Keywords
- marine natural products, drug candidates, bioprospecting, marine invertebrates, marine microorganisms, chemical ecology, chemical defense, marine-derived drugs, cytarabine
- MeSH terms
- Antineoplastic Agents, Biological Products, Clinical Trials as Topic, DNA, Neoplasm, Pharmaceutical Preparations, Enzyme Inhibitors, Humans, Ion Channels, Marine Biology, Microtubules, Phospholipases A, Protein Serine-Threonine Kinases
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