title: Exploring cyanobacterial genomes for natural product biosynthesis pathways.
abstract: Cyanobacteria produce a vast array of natural products, some of which are toxic to human health, while others possess potential pharmaceutical activities. Genome mining enables the identification and characterisation of natural product gene clusters; however, the current number of cyanobacterial genomes remains low compared to other phyla. There has been a recent effort to rectify this issue by increasing the number of sequenced cyanobacterial genomes. This has enabled the identification of biosynthetic gene clusters for structurally diverse metabolites, including non-ribosomal peptides, polyketides, ribosomal peptides, UV-absorbing compounds, alkaloids, terpenes and fatty acids. While some of the identified biosynthetic gene clusters correlate with known metabolites, genome mining also highlights the number and diversity of clusters for which the product is unknown (referred to as orphan gene clusters). A number of bioinformatic tools have recently been developed in order to predict the products of orphan gene clusters; however, in some cases the complexity of the cyanobacterial pathways makes the prediction problematic. This can be overcome by the use of mass spectrometry-guided natural product genome mining, or heterologous expression. Application of these techniques to cyanobacterial natural product gene clusters will be explored.
authors.affiliation: School of Science and Health, University of Western Sydney, Campbelltown, NSW 2560, Australia.
authors.forename: Melinda L
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Micallef
authors.affiliation: School of Science and Health, University of Western Sydney, Campbelltown, NSW 2560, Australia; School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Kensington, NSW 2052, Australia.
authors.forename: Paul M
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: D'Agostino
authors.affiliation: School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Kensington, NSW 2052, Australia.
authors.forename: Bakir
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Al-Sinawi
authors.affiliation: School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales, Kensington, NSW 2052, Australia.
authors.forename: Brett A
authors.initials: BA
authors.lastname: Neilan
authors.affiliation: School of Science and Health, University of Western Sydney, Campbelltown, NSW 2560, Australia. Electronic address: m.moffitt@uws.edu.au.
authors.forename: Michelle C
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Moffitt
mesh_terms: D001688:Biological Products / Q000378:metabolism*; D000458:Cyanobacteria / Q000235:genetics*; D015964:Gene Expression Regulation, Bacterial / Q000502:physiology*; D014644:Genetic Variation; D016680:Genome, Bacterial; D023281:Genomics / Q000379:methods
chemical_list: D001688:Biological Products
keywords: Bioinformatic tools; Cyanobacteria; Genome mining; Heterologous expression; Mass spectrometry; Natural products