For the pharmaceutical industry, the discovery and development of a new drug can take 12 to 15 years, and it can cost up to $2.8 billion. Natural product-based drug discovery is a costly, time-consuming, and laborious process. Nevertheless, it is the most efficient method for producing new drugs, accounting for over 67% of all drugs on the market today. Marine organisms are great resources of drugs, although much less studied than their terrestrial counterparts.
Fifteen marine drugs are currently commercialized, including 8 anticancer drugs. A total of 38 marine natural products are undergoing clinical trials (18 in Phase I, 14 in Phase II, and 6 in Phase III), of which 27 out of 38 are being tested as anticancer drugs. Marine organisms will provide novel anticancer drugs in the near future, with research in the marine natural products field being of utmost importance.
Important breakthroughs have been made in cancer research during the past decades, however, the burden of cancer incidence and mortality is rapidly growing, currently being one of the top death causes worldwide. Meanwhile, most of the major discoveries in marine natural product chemistry have occurred only within the last 50 years. These include several ocean ecosystems, deep-sea resources, and a wealth of natural small molecules and polymers produced by diverse marine species, from which eight anticancer marine-derived drugs have already been approved for clinical use.
Other additional benefits to cancer research were produced by fish models of carcinogenesis and the recent holistic view of health through data collected on zoonotic and vector-borne diseases, leading to the “One Health” perspective.
The vast spectrum of research fields in marine chemistry and cancer research provides a valuable foundation for fostering meaningful dialogue and idea-sharing between scientists. Such interdisciplinary collaborations hold immense potential in opening up exciting new avenues and opportunities for patients, offering fresh perspectives and solutions to tackle the challenges faced in cancer treatment and care.
Areas to be covered in this Research Topic may include but are not limited to:
• Research and innovations in Marine Natural Products (MNP) Drug Discovery and Development,
• Genomic Tools in MNP Discovery
• Links between Chemical Ecology, Ecosystems Functioning, and Cancer Drug Discovery
• Natural Products Isolation and Structural Elucidation
• Synthesis of MNP and Medicinal Chemistry
• Metabolomics Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Applied to MNP Research
• Structural Methods in MNP Research
We welcome different article types including Original Research, Reviews and Mini-Reviews, Methods, Brief Research Reports, and Perspectives. A full list of accepted article types, including descriptions, can be found at this
link.
Please note: studies consisting solely of bioinformatic investigation of publicly available genomic/transcriptomic/proteomic data do not fall within the scope of the section unless they are expanded and provide significant biological or mechanistic insight into the process being studied and will not be accepted as part of this Research Topic.