Chemical biology tools for the characterisation and exploitation of antibiotic biosynthetic pathways

The development of new classes of antibiotics for clinical use is of great importance due to the ever-increasing threat of antimicrobial resistance. This includes peptide antibiotics, which are enzymatically produced by non-ribosomal peptide synthases. Biotechnological approaches to diversify the products of this biosynthetic pathway have great potential for future antibiotic development. In my PhD, chemical biology tools were developed to provide insight into nonribosomal peptide (NRP) biosynthesis, with the aim of enabling future antibiotic diversification. Ultimately, these results represent major progress toward the goal of engineering NRP biosynthesis to produce potent, novel antimicrobial peptides for clinical use.