Memorandum submitted by Professor Marcel
Jaspars
Although I am not a taxonomist, my work would
be impossible without interaction with taxonomists. The work that
I do is the biodiscovery of compounds from marine invertebrates
and microorganisms with possible applications as pharmaceuticals
and biomedical research tools. The interactions are vital to my
research at several levels:
1.
Field taxonomy—if possible all collections
of marine invertebrates (sponges, soft corals, seasquirts) collected
for my work are performed in collaboration with a taxonomist.
I work together with Klaus Feussner at the Institute of Applied
Sciences and the University of the South Pacific in Fiji, who
is an expert at Fijian soft corals, and Chris Battershill of the
Australian Institute of Marine Science, who is a sponge taxonomist
and biotechnologist. Working with these scientists is vital to
assess rapidly in the field whether the species collected has
already been collected before, thus reducing wasted effort and
the identification of a specimen to the family, or even genus
level in the field, as we often have a target list of species
for collection. However, the number of marine invertebrate taxonomists
worldwide is very low, with few sponge specialists (ca
30) and only a handful of soft coral experts who are not nearing
retirement age (eg Phil Alderslade, Darwin Museum, Australia;
Leen van Ofwegen, Naturalis, Leiden, the Netherlands). With seasquirts,
the situation is even more serious, and for the region I am interested
in there is really only one authority (Patt Kott, Brisbane). Despite
the obvious attractions, few people are taking up marine invertebrate
taxonomy—the loss of Michelle Kelly from the NHM meant the
UK lost its authority in sponge taxonomy. There are still pockets
of excellence and the recent appointment of Jo Porter (bryozoan
specialist) at Aberystwyth, means that there are some young scientists
entering the field. The value of drug discovery from marine invertebrates
is exemplified by the EMEA's recent approval of Yondelis (Trabectidin),
derived from a seasquirt, for the treatment of soft tissue sarcoma,
for which there is no other treatment. In addition, roughly 30
marine invertebrate derived natural products are in, or are nearing,
clinical trials for a variety of diseases. The loss of our ability
to do taxonomy on these species would bring this promising field
to its knees.
2.
In the work involving marine microorganisms, taxonomy
is essential as the rediscovery rate of natural products from
these organisms is greater than 99 per cent. This means that robust
polyphasic taxonomy is essential to indicate the existence of
a new species that may then be investigated for novel biologically
active chemical entities. The UK used to be at the forefront of
marine microbial taxonomy, but the recent retirement of Alan Bull
(Kent) and the impending retirement of Mike Goodfellow (Newcastle)
means that the UK will lose its unique position in this field.
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