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

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

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)

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

AMR-related collaborations South African context: EU FP7 PharmaSea Increasing Value and Flow in the Marine Biodiscovery Pipeline 2012-2017 with University of the West Cape. EU-RISE OceanMedicines, 2015-2019, with University of the West Cape; EU-Marie Curie ITN MarPipe, 2016-2020, with University of the West Cape; Royal Society Newton Senior fellowship for anti-TB marine natural products 2016-2017 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.