Tag: Streptomyces

First discovered from a microbe in a Japanese soil sample, the precursor to ivermectin is indeed a natural product. However, the final antiparasitic medication, ivermectin, is not purely natural but a semisynthetic derivative, created through a specific chemical modification process.

The broad-spectrum antibiotic known as chloramphenicol was first isolated in 1947 from a sample of soil from Venezuela. Its discovery was a landmark event in medicine, tracing the origins of a powerful drug directly back to a microorganism, revealing that the natural source of chloramphenicol is the soil-dwelling bacterium *Streptomyces venezuelae*. While the drug is now produced synthetically, its roots in nature are a key part of its pharmacological history.

Natamycin, also known as pimaricin, is a natural antifungal agent that is produced through the fermentation of soil-dwelling bacteria, primarily *Streptomyces natalensis*. This biological origin directly answers the question, **what is natamycin made of?**, and underpins its widespread use as both a medication and a food preservative.

According to a 2016 analysis of drug name spellings in PubMed, the incorrect variant “gentamycin” appeared nearly 2,000 times, illustrating a widespread confusion. So, is it gentamicin or gentamycin? The definitive and correct spelling for this common antibiotic is **gentamicin**.

Within the aminoglycoside class of antibiotics, the specific spelling of the suffix, whether '-micin' or '-mycin', reveals the antibiotic's bacterial origin [1.3.2]. Understanding what is the difference between Micin and mycin is crucial for grasping their classification.