Ecological functions of bioactive natural products from lichens

Lichens are symbiotic consortia consisting of fungi, algae, and specific suites of associated bacteria, which produce a plethora of unique and bioactive natural products. Most species have a low biomass, grow slowly, and are difficult to cultivate and manipulate in the lab. Thus, the pharmaceutical potential, and the ecological roles of lichen substances are underexplored. Here, we develop genomic tools to better understand the molecular background of natural product biosynthesis in lichens, and facilitate biotechnological approaches to harvesting lichen compounds. Specifically, we address the questions: 1) Which biosynthetic gene clusters and compounds are involved in environmental adaptation of lichens? 2) Can we link compounds to gene clusters? 3) Which lichen substances, or substance combinations, have pharmaceutical potential? We use metagenomic whole thallus sequencing to investigate biosynthetic genes of fungal and bacterial genomes in the lichen symbiosis.