Molecular Biomarkers & Diagnosis

Red Sea Microbial Diversity for Antimicrobial and Anticancer Agents

Abstract

Nadeem F, Oves M, Qari HA and Ismail IMI

Marine natural products are valuable sources that could produce potential chemotherapeutic agents, and marinederived organisms are widely recognized as important sources of these natural products with interesting biological activities. Furthermore, Red sea was recognized as a rich source of microbial diversity with unique metabolites that can be of pharmaceutical and medicinal importance. The discovery of novel active metabolites provides an intellectual challenge to examine new products for medicinal purposes. Although many bacterial strains were isolated from Red sea with potent bioactivities; however, the microbial diversity of marine environment such Red sea remained largely un-explored. Lately, it has been possible to easily collect marine samples, isolate, and further identify diverse marine organisms (e.g. bacteria, fungi, and algae and marine invertebrate) by modern molecular techniques. Based on a wide range of screening and extraction methods, a vast number of metabolites have been extracted from marine sources with potential biological activities such as antibacterial, anticancer, anti-inflammatory agents and many others. In this article, we have reviewed the previous studies that have been conducted to explore marine-derived bioactives of Red sea. In addition, we have illustrated the following aspects: (i) Red sea microbial diversity for antibacterial and anticancer agents; (ii) the conventional and molecular approach used for screening and characterization marine microorganisms; (iii) characterization of natural products of microbial origin, and (iv) drug development from novel marine-derived metabolites and clinical trials. Moreover, modern molecular technologies, meta-genomic, proteomic and bio-chemo-informatics approaches are adding more potency to the targeted search of bioactive compounds derived from marine microbes. The novel marine derived drug discovery is aimed to improve our understanding of natural resources, to improve public health awareness about the environmental microbial diversity and their importance for nutraceuticals, pharmaceutical, agrochemicals and food processing. Recently, the research area of microbial diversity of the Red sea and their metabolites has opened a new access for significant sources of more effective drug entities with low coast.