Endophytic fungi for producing bioactive compounds originally from their host plants

Plant endophytic fungi are an important and novel resource of natural bioactive compounds with their potential applications in agriculture, medicine and food industry. In the past two decades, many valuable bioactive compounds with antimicrobial, insecticidal, cytotoxic and anticancer activities have been successfully discovered from the endophytic fungi. During the long period of co-evolution, a friendly relationship was formed between each endophyte and its host plant. Some endophytes have the ability to produce the same or similar bioactive compounds as those originated from their host plants. This chapter mainly reviewed the research progress on the endophytic fungi for producing plant-derived bioactive compounds such as paclitaxel, podophyllotoxin, camptothecine, vinblastine, hypericin and diosgenin etc. The relations between the endophytic fungi and their host plants, some available strategies for efficiently promoting production of these bioactive compounds, as well as their potential applications in the future are also discussed. It is beneficial for us to better understand and take advantage of plant endophytic fungi.