Marine bioactive compounds as a source for new anticancer drugs

Time: Tuesday June 18th at 15:00

Place: Auditorium 4, BB-building, Jonas Lies vei 91, Bergen

Speaker: Professor Jeanette Hammer Andersen, director of Marbio at the University of Tromsø / the Arctic University of Norway.

Marbio is a high capacity analysis platform for screening and identifying unique bioactive molecules isolated from marine material. Marbio is looking for eg. enzymes and enzyme inhibitors and substances that can kill
cancer cells, are immunosuppressive or immunostimulatory or inhibit the growth of bacteria and viruses.

Abstract:
The success of natural products in drug discovery is unparalleled, more than  60 % of the new chemical entities introduced into the clinic originated from, or were inspired by, natural products. Even so, many pharmaceutical companies turned away from natural products as a source of lead compounds, due to the perception that natural products are both difficult to access and to work with. As the marine environment and its organisms have become more accessible over the last decades, it is expected that the ocean will be the next great source of novel chemistry. The rate of new marine natural products discovered is increasing every year.

Marbio, UiT explore Arctic and sub-Arctic marine organisms, searching for compounds with activities against cancer, bacteria and diabetes as well as compounds with immunomodulatory and antioxidative effects. Our screening campaign has been based on a classic bioassay-guided fractionation approach. We are screening a unique collection of cold-water invertebrates and marine microorganisms, and we have identified several novel bioactive structures in the collection. The presentation will give an overview of the workflow in Marbio and some of our results from the anticancer screening program.

Chairperson: Professor Bjørn Tore Gjertsen