""""""""Discovery of natural product-based drugs from Costa Rican Biota"""""""" is a consortium of researchers from academia and industry organized in response to a RFA to form an International Cooperative Biodiversity Group (ICBG). Significant progress was made during an R21-supported planning phase. The ICBG described in this proposal involves programs located in the US and Costa Rica that will cooperate to: improve human health through the discovery of bioactive natural products from Costa Rica's rich biodiversity, focus the natural product search on unexplored and under explored microorganisms such as marine bacteria, environmental DMA, endophytic fungi, and myxobacteria, and improve the research capacity and economic opportunities for Costa Rica and contribute to its National Biodiversity Strategy through gathering data for its biodiversity inventory, intensive screening of its natural products in medically relevant assays, sharing of resources, clear benefit-sharing, and training of students and visiting scientists. These broad aims will be carried out by four Associate Programs. AP1, entitled Screening and Informatics, is at Harvard Medical School; AP2, entitled From Unique Sources to Microorganisms: Inventory and Bioprospecting in Costa Rica, is at the National Institute of Biodiversity (INBio) in Costa Rica; APS, entitled Harnessing Secondary Metabolic Pathways from Microbial Systems, is at the University of Michigan; and AP4, entitled Chemistry and Environmental DNA, is also at the Harvard Medical School. These four programs have a highly integrated work plan, and the three institutions have reached an agreement in principle on intellectual property and benefit sharing. Several training and capacity building aspects are also incorporated in the plan. / Natural products have been the single greatest source of medically useful small molecules, and this ICBG by exploring new sources, using a large number of biological assays, and having an industrial development partner, has an excellent chance of finding additional medically useful small molecules. ? ?
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