polyketides
Research Article | Host-Microbe BiologyIncreased Biosynthetic Gene Dosage in a Genome-Reduced Defensive Bacterial SymbiontSecondary metabolites, which are small-molecule organic compounds produced by living organisms, provide or inspire drugs for many different diseases. These natural products have evolved over millions of years to provide a survival benefit to the producing organism and often display potent biological activity with important therapeutic applications. For instance, defensive compounds in the environment may be cytotoxic to eukaryotic cells...
Research Article | Molecular Biology and PhysiologyLarge-Scale Bioinformatics Analysis of Bacillus Genomes Uncovers Conserved Roles of Natural Products in Bacterial PhysiologyBacilli are capable of producing a diverse array of specialized metabolites, many of which have gained attention for their roles as signals that affect bacterial physiology and development. Up to this point, however, the Bacillus genus’s metabolic capacity has been underexplored. We undertook a deep genomic analysis of 1,566 Bacillus genomes to understand the full spectrum of metabolites that this bacterial...