Bioprospecting for microbial endophytes and their natural products

Abstract

Endophytes are microorganisms that reside asymptomatically in internal tissues of all higher plants. There is growing interest amongst the researches about this group of organisms because these are promising sources of biologically active agents. They are potential sources of novel natural products for scope of utilization in the pharmaceutical industry, agriculture, and in environmental applications. Many researches have proven that endophyte in new and potential source of novel natural products for exploitation in modern medicine, agriculture and industry. So far, a great number of novel natural products possessing antimicrobial activities have been isolated from endophytes. It is believed that screening for antimicrobial compounds from endophytes is a promising way to overcome the increasing threat of drug resistant strains of human and plant pathogen. Antimicrobial metabolites isolated from endophytes belong to diverse structural classes, including: alkaloids, peptides, steroids, terpenoids, phenols, quinones, and flavonoids. These would provide the opportunity to utilize endophytes as a new source for production of antibiotics.