The Department of Biosynthesis of Natural Products (DBNP) was founded in 1980 on the basis of the medicinal plant tissue culture research group (Professor ZHU Wei-Hua's group) and the medicinal fungi research group (Professor YANG Yun-Peng's group). In its early days, the department was co-headed by these two professors. Their research interestes were to investigate biosynthesis, biotransformation and fermentation of natural medicines by using modern biotechnologies including cell engineering, fermentation engineering, gene engineering and enzyme engineering. It currently has 20 professional researchers including 6 Ph.D. supervisors and 4 M.Sc. supervisors.
The DBNP has made remarkable progress in the biosynthesis and synthetic biology of Taxol and unnatural ginsenosides; discovery and mechanistic elucidation of new glycosylhydrolases, glycosyltransferases, prenyltransferases and terpene synthases as well as their application; biosynthetic gene mining and pathway deciphering of bioactive natural products. Representative research achievements include authorization of dozens of patents in China and overseas countries and considerable publications in the world's top peer-reviewed journals like Nature Chemistry, Nature Chemical Biology, Nature Communications, Angewandte Chemie International Edition, ACS Catalysis, Green Chemistry, Acta Pharmaceutica Sinica B and Metabolic Engineering. In addition, the marketed new TCM product Jin Shui Bao Capsule, which is prepared from the fermented Paecilomyces hepiali (strain Cs-4) separated from the Ophiocordyceps sinensis (Dong Chong Xia Cao in Chinese), has achieved an annual sales income of over RMB 6 billions.
Main research interests:
1) Biosynthesis and synthetic biology of natural medicines.
2) Discovery of new bioactive substances and investigation of innovative drugs.
