Finding Cancer Treatments in Nature
From antibiotics to painkillers to cancer drugs, many molecules found in nature have proven to be remedies for human disease. At Memorial Sloan Kettering, a handful of drugs now in clinical trials have been derived from sources ranging from microorganisms to plants to marine creatures. The theory behind the development of drugs from natural products is that these molecules inherently have some kind of biological function, and that function can be enhanced and exploited to develop effective treatments for patients.