Advances and Opportunities of Natural Products in Drug Discovery
A special issue of Molecules (ISSN 1420-3049). This special issue belongs to the section "Natural Products Chemistry".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 April 2026 | Viewed by 13
Special Issue Editor
Interests: natural products; experimental oncology; biotechnology; natural products biotechnology
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Natural products have long been an important component of drug development, providing structurally diverse and pharmacologically active molecules. Recent improvements in analytical techniques such as high-resolution mass spectrometry, NMR spectroscopy, and genome mining have renewed interest in these substances, enabling the rapid identification and characterization of complex natural molecules. In addition, advances in synthetic biology and metabolic engineering are enabling researchers to maximize the production of natural commodities and derivatives, thereby addressing supply and sustainability concerns.
The incorporation of artificial intelligence and machine learning into natural product research has also provided new opportunities to predict biological activities, discover novel biosynthetic pathways, and accelerate lead optimization. Furthermore, research in underexplored ecosystems such as deep-sea environments, extreme habitats, and microbiomes continues to yield novel bioactive chemicals with potential therapeutic applications.
This Special Issue encourages submissions of original research articles and reviews of natural products in drug discovery. We only accept submissions of chemically well-characterized compounds.
Prof. Dr. Daniel Pereira Bezerra
Guest Editor
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Molecules is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- natural products
- drug discovery
- pharmacological activity
- biological activity
- new compounds
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