Meta-approaches to harvest natural products from harmful algae blooms

In 2009, Ross Youngs established the company Biosortia Pharmaceuticals based on a new harvesting technique utilizing microalgae natural products chemistry to overcome the lack of efficiency of drug discovery. This approach has focused on the micro-algal consortia using a meta-metabolomics and a mega-scale approach.

Global warming and rising CO₂ concentrations in the atmosphere play a principal role in intensifying phytoplankton blooms in eutrophic and hypertrophic lakes. Harmful algae blooms have pivotal ecological and economical impacts because of the toxic secondary metabolites produced by algae-related microorganisms. However, these metabolites ironically can also serve as a source of new drug leads or in the construction of new drug leads.^a

Biosortia has developed a unique harvesting technology capable of acquiring a large quantities of biomass containing a wide diversity of microorganisms grown under stress conditions originating from the environmental competition during a bloom where gene mutations and evolution in the related microorganisms are promoted.^b These approaches may provide access to new complex biology and chemistry. A preliminary screening has already revealed several promising hits for treatment of various diseases including cancer, neurological diseases, metabolic diseases, infectious diseases, and antiparasitic. This uncommon protocol of discovering new natural products may offer new drug-like molecules for many disease targets.

^aPenn, K. et al. ISME J 2014, 8 (9), 1866 – 1878. ^bUchiyama, J. et al., Photosynth Res 2015, 1 – 12