1. Overview of my expertise
UK-South Africa AMR Drug Development Workshop
Hai Deng, Department of Chemistry, University of Aberdeen
Overview of my expertise
Developed new algorithms of sample dereplication to accelerate discovery processes and avoid re-isolation of known compounds
Our own collection of bacterial strains from the UK environments
Microbiol
Heterologous expression methods of silent BGCs
Geno seq & bioinfo
Mol. biol.
Anal. & org. chem
Central goal:
New antimicrobial agent discovery to address AMR with mitigation strategies
Natural product chemistry from marine and terrestrial sources
Expeditious routes to creating improved antibiotics combined synthetic biology and synthetic chemistry
Discovery of new biosynthetic enzymes as biocatalysts for antimicrobial compound libraries
3-6 June, Cape Town South Africa

2. Marine microorganisms
What inclusion of your University/wider research organisation brings
Aim: The discovery of novel pharmaceutical
candidates and research tools from extreme
environments.
marine biodiscovery centre
Functions
Biosynthesis
New biotransformation
Marine invertebrates
Marine microorganisms
& Symbionts
Tools
Chromatography
Spectroscopy
Molecular biology
Enzymology
Applications:
Pharmaceutical
Infection
Inflammation
Expertise offered in the Centre:
Natural Product chemistry/biosynthesis; Pharmacy & Pharmacognosy; Analytical Methods (new LC-MS-and-database guided dereplication); Organic Synthesis; Capacity building and Internationalization

3. What inclusion of your University/wider research organisation brings
Centre for Bacteria in Health and Disease
Mission:
new antimicrobial discovery;
mitigate infection through expanding healthy microbiome;
Antimicrobial stewardship for infection prevention and control
Expertise offered in the Centre:
Infectious bacteria and their interactions with human cells, Gut microbes and AMR, clinical microbiology and Natural Product Chemistry/biosynthesis;
East Scotland context:
Ongoing collaboration with Royal Society/Wolfson funded St Andrews Multidisciplinary Anti-infective Research and Therapeutics (SMART) Centre)

4. Contribution to a consortium
>300 novel bacterial strains isolated obtained from UK territories and seas and Sediments from unique marine environments as well as legacy collections from previous collaborative projects
New methods of LC-MS-databased screening metrics for rapid prioritization of samples to accelerate the discovery of new antimicrobials;
Mitigation routes to creating new and improved antibiotics through blending synthetic biology and synthetic chemistry ;
Extensive experience of natural product discovery and biosynthesis as a team
Capacity building experience in the African context;
Considerable experiences of the collaboration with South African researchers

5. AMR-related collaborations
South African context:
EU FP7 PharmaSea Increasing Value and Flow in the Marine Biodiscovery Pipeline with University of the West Cape.
EU-RISE OceanMedicines, , with University of the West Cape;
EU-Marie Curie ITN MarPipe, , with University of the West Cape;
Royal Society Newton Senior fellowship for anti-TB marine natural products with University of Cape Town.
African context:
Leverhulme Trust – Royal Scoiety Africa Awards 2010 – 2013 with Ghanaian Researchers
MRC African research leaders fellowship 2018 – 2023 with Ghanaian researcher.
Potential collaborators:
University of the Western Cape;
Cape Peninsula University of Technology;
University of Cape Town.