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  • Ocean Sciences Supplement
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Drugs from the sea—fact or fantasy?

Drugs from the sea are as much a potential marine resource as cultivated fish, and mineral deposits. The study of the chemical structure and properties of unusual metabolic products of marine life is a subject where marine ecology and the experimental sciences of chemistry, biochemistry, pharmacology and medicine share a common and complementary interest. The development of ad hoc collaboration between specialists has advanced basic knowledge and resulted in a significant feedback to marine biology and ecology as well as in the development of some useful drugs.

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Grant, P., Mackie, A. Drugs from the sea—fact or fantasy?. Nature 267, 786–788 (1977). https://doi.org/10.1038/267786a0

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