A research group led by Professor Midori A. Arai, Associate Professor Shun Saito, and third-year doctoral student Yukiko Ujie (at the time of the research) of the Department of Biosciences and Informatics, Faculty of Science and Technology, Keio University, discovered that interactions between pathogenic fungi and macrophages activate the fungi's ability to produce secondary metabolites, resulting in the production of novel natural products. They also successfully elucidated the detailed mechanism of this interaction.
Activating silent genes in microorganisms can produce many novel natural products, accelerating natural product drug discovery. In this study, they discovered that novel natural products can be obtained using a unique co-culture system of pathogenic fungi and immune cells and further revealed that the competition for survival between pathogenic microorganisms and macrophages is key to activating secondary metabolite production. The results of this study were published in the American Chemical Society journal, Journal of Natural Products on August 28, 2025. This article will be included in a special issue entitled "Natural Product Signals – from microbiomes to the environment."
