Marine Natural Products from Microalgae: An -Omics Overview.

Area of Science:

• Marine biology
• Biotechnology
• Genomics

Background:

• Increasing availability of -omics datasets for diverse marine microalgae.
• Marine microalgae possess unique metabolic pathways and produce bioactive secondary metabolites with potential applications.
• High diversity of microalgae offers opportunities for discovering novel natural products.

Purpose of the Study:

• To provide a comprehensive overview of current efforts in producing, exploring, and exploiting -omics datasets for marine microalgae.
• To identify microalgal species and strains with high potential for novel marine natural product discovery.
• To present funding initiatives and future perspectives for marine microalgal -omics resources.

Main Methods:

• Review of existing literature and -omics data resources for marine microalgae.
• Analysis of metabolic pathways and secondary metabolite production in various microalgal species.
• Evaluation of strategies for data exploration and exploitation.

Main Results:

• Marine microalgae are a rich source of diverse bioactive compounds.
• -Omics data are crucial for identifying promising species and strains.
• Current efforts focus on data generation, accessibility, and analysis.

Conclusions:

• Harnessing marine microalgal -omics data is key to discovering novel bioactive natural products.
• Continued investment in -omics resources and research is essential for biotechnological and biomedical advancements.
• Exploiting the metabolic diversity of marine microalgae holds significant promise for future applications.