Biosynthesis of marine peptide natural products

Saframycin-like ecteinascidins and patellamides are two groups of cytotoxic marine peptide natural products with potential application as anticancer therapeutics. The biosynthesis of the saframycins occurs through nonribosomal peptide synthesis and we show that the biosynthesis of the patellamides utilizes ribosomal peptide synthesis. This thesis contains investigations and insights into these biosynthetic systems and reports the successful heterologous production of patellamide A.