Nature's Chemicals

• Provides a fascinating insight into the crucial importance of Natural Products to human activities and the global economy throughout recorded history
• Adopts a simple evolutionary theory to form the backbone of the book and provide a theoretical framework to explain the evolution of metabolism
• Clear and simple explanation of biochemical concepts aimed at a general readership
• Tackles applied issues such as pharmaceutical drug discovery and drug design

Readership: Suitable for senior undergraduate and graduate level students taking related courses in natural product chemistry and biochemistry.

Richard Firn, Retired from the Department of Biology, University of York

"Thanks to a liberal supply of historical notes, personal and often sharply critical opinions and an enlivening ability to broaden the context, Richard Firn's book is thus something of a page-turner and one a latter day Sherlock Holmes might conceivably have written." - Annals of Botany

"Presented in a thought-provoking way." - Chemistry World

1: What are Natural Products?
2: The Importance of NPs in Human Affairs
3: The Main Classes of NPs - Only a Few Pathways Lead to the Majority of NPs
4: Are NPs Different from Synthetic Chemicals?
5: Why Do Organisms Make NPs?
6: NPs, Chemicals and the Environment
7: Natural Products and the Pharmaceutical Industry
8: The Chemical Interactions Between Organisms
9: The Evolution of Metabolism
10: The Genetic Modification of NP Pathways - Possible Opportunities and Possible Pitfalls
Notes
Index