Elucidation of variability of secondary metabolism in filamentous fungi by comparative genomics

Abstract

  Recent advances in genome determination provided an insight that filamentous fungi have many and much varied genes involved in secondary metabolism. Most of them remain unstudied, which provides room for investigation of potential drug lead compounds. We studied secondary metabolism in filamentous fungi by using transcriptome data and comparing newly obtained genome sequences among closely related species. These works resulted in discovery of a gene cluster involved in biosynthesis of conidia-specific accumulated compound trypacidin, and shed light on complex evolution of secondary metabolism in filamentous fungi.