The Evolving Role of Natural Products in Drug Discovery

Natural products have traditionally been the source of medicines, and recently re-emerged as highly profitable tools in modern drug discovery, most likely thanks to their incredible and unique chemical diversity that is difficult to reproduce in common libraries of synthetic compounds. Particularly compared to combinatorial compounds, analysis of physicochemical properties highlights that natural products occupy a much larger area in molecular space, and are evolutionarily optimized as drug-like molecules.

This special issue aims to showcase the latest research trends in drug discovery by exploiting natural sources. We invite authors to report multimethodological approach, including synthetic chemistry, computational chemistry, biology and pharmacology. We are welcoming both original research articles and review articles on medicinal chemistry, organic synthesis and chemical biology.

Guest Editor Professor Bruno Botta Sapienza University of Rome, Italy

Guest Editor Professor Giuseppe La Regina Sapienza University of Rome, Italy