Abstract Currently, antimicrobial resistance has become a global public health problem, which has made the need for new antimicrobial compounds to deal with resistant infections an emergency. However, environments that once offered so many innovative molecules, now already exhaustively exploited, do not meet this need. In this context, a geographically isolated, under-explored and extreme environment, such as Antarctica, which holds organisms with unique physiological and biochemical characteristics, assumes great importance as a potential source of new compounds with antimicrobial activity. In this patent review, we investigate the state of technological development in the field of antimicrobial compounds obtained from Antarctic organisms, highlighting the main countries and researchers active in the field, the species utilized, the compounds obtained, and their possible therapeutic applications. As results, few patent documents were found, however they encompass a wide diversity of compounds and species, indicating a great antimicrobial potential present in Antarctic biota, including compounds active against the most important human pathogenic microorganisms, such as including methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus spp. and multi-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Furthermore, due to the increasing trend in patent applications, a significant rise in the number of patents in this area is expected in the coming years.

Abstract In the Antarctic environment, yeasts are versatile eukaryotes that have shown wide dispersion in different substrates, producing active enzymes in extreme conditions, but their relevance in biotechnological applications is largely unknown. The aim of this study was to evaluate the production of extracellular hydrolases by yeasts isolated from Antarctic lichens and molecularly identify these isolates. From a total of 144 isolates on the screening, 109 (76%) produced at least one of the hydrolases tested, with most activities for proteases 59 (41%), cellulases 58 (40%), esterases 57 (39%), lipases 29 (20%), amylases 23 (16%) and pectinases 20 (14%). Among these isolates, 76 were identified, most belonged to the phylum Basidiomycota (n=73) with the dominance of Vishniacozyma victoriae (n=27), Cystobasidium alpinum (n=3), Mrakia niccombsii (n=3), Cystobasidium laryngis (n=2), Bannozyma yamatoana (n=2), Holtermanniella nyarrowii (n=2), and Glaciozyma martinii (n=2). This study is the first one reporting extracellular enzyme production by yeasts isolated from thallus of the species of Antarctic lichens Lecania brialmontii, Polycauliona candelaria, Usnea capillacea, Cladonia metacorallifera, and Polycauliona regalis. With these data, it’s possible to confirm lichens as a source of hydrolase-producing yeasts, reinforcing the potential of these microorganisms in bioprospecting studies of catalytic molecules from polar regions that may be useful in promising biotechnological applications.