Analysis of fungal secondary metabolites biosynthesis and regulatory mechanism
Research Scientist
C.S. Yun
Fungi produce variety kind of small molecules known as secondary metabolites and attracted intense research interest due to their bioactivities. The recent sequencing of fungal genomes has shown that fungi are richer in secondary metabolism-related genes than previously believed. However, the majority of these genes are silent or quiescent under laboratory culture conditions. Our research theme is activate these silent secondary metabolite biosynthetic genes to find out useful chemical compounds in fungi. Recently, we found biosynthetic gene of mycotoxin, tenuazonic acid in fungi by activation of tenuazonic acid biosynthetic gene. Now we are investigating the regulatory mechanism of tenuazonic acid production in fungi. We also trying to find out novel fungal secondary metabolites and elucidate their regulatory mechanism by using chemical biology methods.