Most bacteria cannot be grown in the laboratory, which means that their genetic diversity is hidden to traditional culture-based studies. We combined a new DNA extraction method, long-read sequencing, bioinformatics and chemical synthesis to access the genetic diversity of uncultured soil bacteria and abiotically decode it to discover bioactive small molecules.
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This is a summary of: Burian, J. et al. Bioactive molecules unearthed by terabase-scale long-read sequencing of a soil metagenome. Nat. Biotechnol. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41587-025-02810-w (2025).
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Long-read sequencing and chemical synthesis access previously hidden antibiotics. Nat Biotechnol (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41587-025-02861-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41587-025-02861-z
