Teaching an old dog new tricks: Drug discovery by repositioning natural products and their derivatives

Given the substantial cost and low success rate of drug discovery and development, repositioning existing drugs to treat new diseases has gained significant attention in recent years, with potentially lower development costs and shorter time frames. Natural products show great promise in drug repositioning because they have been used for various medical purposes for thousands of years. In this review, we discuss the drug repositioning of six prototypical natural products and their derivatives to reveal new drug-disease associations. We also highlight opportunities and challenges in natural product-based drug repositioning for future reference.

Automated summary

Given the high cost and low success rate of drug discovery and development, repositioning existing drugs for new diseases has become a popular research area. Natural products have shown potential in this field due to their long history of use in various medical purposes. This review discusses the repositioning of six typical natural products and their derivatives to discover new drug-disease associations, while also highlighting the opportunities and challenges in natural product-based drug repositioning for future reference.