Natural products as catalysts for innovation: a pharmaceutical industry perspective.

There is a constant need for new targets in pharmaceutical research which consequently requires access to novel chemical compounds complementing human genetic or biomarker related approaches. Natural products are evolutionarily designed and chemically distinct from most synthetic library molecules. Besides their role as drugs, they are successfully used to unveil disease relevant targets as molecular probes. Novel natural products can still be 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 imminent practical use in industrial drug discovery programs, these concepts must be advanced beyond their current state and validated