Look at the 1940s/1950s when some classic antibiotics were discovered. Pharma workers taking vacations overseas were asked to bring soil samples back to the lab. Great reading if you enjoy science history.

https://asm.org/articles/2023/june/hunting-for-antibiotics-i...

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pkaye 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Some of the immunosuppressant drugs were discovered from bacteria in soil including Tacrolimus and Sirolimus. And Cyclosporine and Mycophenolate came from a fungus in soil.

I have a kidney transplant and use two of these medications daily.

	▲	DaveZale 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Easter Island! Both of those. Tacrolimus was discovered in 1987 by a Japanese team led by pharmacologist Tohru Kino; it was among the first macrolide immunosuppressants discovered, preceded by the discovery of rapamycin (sirolimus) on Rapa Nui (Easter Island) in 1975.[45] It is produced by a soil bacterium, Streptomyces tsukubensis.[46] The name tacrolimus is derived from "Tsukuba macrolide immunosuppressant".[47] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tacrolimus When you study organic synthesis, these kinds of structures are the Holy Grail. Sometimes it takes dozens of steps, and an overall yield of just a few percent to make them synthetically.