Marine Microorganisms

Chitinases from uncultured marine microorganisms.

Our understanding of the degradation of organic matter will benefit from a greater appreciation for the genes encoding enzymes involved in the hydrolysis of biopolymers such as chitin, one of the most abundant polymers in nature. To isolate representative and abundant chitinase genes from uncultivated marine bacteria, we constructed libraries of genomic DNA isolated from coastal and estuarine w...

Secondary metabolites from marine microorganisms.

After 40 years of intensive research, chemistry of marine natural products has become a mature field. Since 1995, there are signals of decreased interest in the search of new metabolites from traditional sources such as macroalgae and octocorals, and the number of annual reports on marine sponges stabilized. On the contrary, metabolites from microorganisms is a rapidly growing field, due, at le...

Natural Products from Marine Microorganisms

Studying marine microorganisms from space.

Microorganisms are but a few micrometers in diameter and are not visible to the naked eye. Yet, the large numbers of microorganisms present in the oceans and the global impact of their activities make it possible to observe them from space. Here a few examples of how microorganisms can be studied from satellites are presented. The first case is the best known: the main pigment used in photosynt...

Marine Fungi: The Untapped Diversity of Marine Microorganisms

It has been very well established for more than half a century [1] that terrestrial bacteria and fungi are sources of valuable bioactive metabolites. It has also been noted that the rate at which new compounds are being discovered from traditional microbial resources, however, has diminished significantly in recent decades as exhaustive studies of soil microorganisms repeatedly yield the same s...