Marine Biomedicine

Natural products have had a crucial role in identifying novel chemical entities with useful drug properties. Marine natural products, the secondary or non-primary metabolites produced by organisms that live in the sea, have received increasing attention from chemists and pharmacologists in last two decades. The anticancer agent Taxol was sourced from a plant, penicillin from a fungus, and a number of recent breakthroughs have resulted in the development and approval of anticancer drugs derived from marine sources such as coral and sponges. Marine biotechnology has demonstrated its potential across a broad spectrum of applications that range from biomedicine to the environment. The marine environment, with its enormous wealth of biological and chemical diversity, represents a treasure trove of useful materials awaiting discovery. Indeed, a number of clinically useful drugs, investigational drug candidates, and pharmacological tools have already resulted from marine-product discovery programs. However, a number of key areas for future investigation are anticipated to increase the application and yield of useful marine bio-products.

This book ‘Marine Biomedicine’ addresses the wide variety of marine drug discovery research activities ranging from finding biological samples to clinical trials; includes the contribution of eminent researchers and authors in this dynamic area of research. Focusing new technologies in this field, this valued book provides comprehensive information of both what is currently achieved in the field as well as what is being done in marine natural products research. It will address the newly discovered and tremendous potential that the biodiversity of the marine ecosystem offers as a source for new therapeutically useful compounds, from the early stage drug discovery perspective of academia and the clinical therapy development perspective of industry.