Nature’s chemical toolkit
Plants and microbes produce thousands of chemicals that facilitate communication with pollinators, competitors and predators
Read the storyPlants and microbes produce thousands of chemicals that facilitate communication with pollinators, competitors and predators
Read the storyScientists have made public all the data they have so far on the genetic blueprint of medicinal plants and what beneficial properties are encoded by the genes identified
Read the storyScientists have worked out the structure of a class of enzyme that has been genetically validated as a new drug target in Mycobacterium tuberculosis, a pathogenic bacterium which is responsible for 2 million tuberculosis deaths worldwide each year
Read the storyA novel way of increasing the amounts of antibiotics produced by bacteria has been discovered that could markedly improve the yields of these important compounds in commercial production
Read the storyPlants produce a vast array of natural products, many of which we find useful for making things such as drugs
Read the storyIn the first study of its kind, researchers have used tools of paleontology to gain new insights into the diversity of natural plant chemicals
Read the storyWorking out the structure of a complex formed when a protein binds to DNA has proved to be key in understanding how an antibiotic-producing organism controls resistance to its own antibiotic, and may be an example of how other antibiotic producers regulate export to prevent self-toxicity
Read the storyScientists researching a new antibiotic have pieced together the way it is produced by a soil bacterium by working out the functions of its genes
Read the storyScientists are collaborating on a new international research project to identify antibiotics that can kill tuberculosis and fight resistant strains
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