title: Natural products as catalysts for innovation: a pharmaceutical industry perspective.
abstract: Natural products are evolutionarily designed and chemically distinct from most synthetic library molecules. In addition to their role as drugs, they are successfully used as molecular probes to identify disease relevant targets. Novel natural products are still routinely discovered from traditional sources through cultivation of microorganisms. Complementary approaches based on genome sequence information and subsequent annotation of biosynthetic pathways are emerging technologies. However, to be of practical use for drug discovery, these concepts must be advanced beyond their current state.
authors.affiliation: Natural Products Unit, Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research, Novartis Pharma AG, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Esther K
authors.initials: EK
authors.lastname: Schmitt
authors.forename: Charles M
authors.initials: CM
authors.lastname: Moore
authors.forename: Philipp
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Krastel
authors.forename: Frank
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Petersen
mesh_terms: D044822:Biodiversity; D001688:Biological Products / Q000737:chemistry*; D055808:Drug Discovery / Q000379:methods*; D004345:Drug Industry / Q000379:methods*; D057890:Epigenomics / Q000379:methods*; D016678:Genome; D057166:High-Throughput Screening Assays / Q000379:methods; D006801:Humans; D015335:Molecular Probes / Q000737:chemistry*; D015394:Molecular Structure; D013678:Technology, Pharmaceutical / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D001688:Biological Products; D015335:Molecular Probes