The rapid emergence of multidrug-resistant (MDR) bacterial pathogens poses a 
major threat for human health. In recent years, genome sequencing has unveiled 
many poorly expressed antibiotic clusters in actinomycetes. Here, we report a 
well-defined ecological collection of >800 actinomycetes obtained from sites in 
the Himalaya and Qinling mountains, and we used these in a concept study to see 
how efficiently antibiotics can be elicited against MDR pathogens isolated 
recently from the clinic. Using 40 different growth conditions, 96 actinomycetes 
were identified - predominantly Streptomyces - that produced antibiotics with 
efficacy against the MDR clinical isolates referred to as ESKAPE pathogens: 
Enterococcus faecium, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, 
Acinetobacter baumannii, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and/or Enterobacter cloacae. 
Antimicrobial activities that fluctuated strongly with growth conditions were 
correlated with specific compounds, including borrelidin, resistomycin, 
carbomethoxy-phenazine, and 6,7,8- and 5,6,8-trimethoxy-3-methylisocoumarin, of 
which the latter was not described previously. Our work provided insights into 
the potential of actinomycetes as producers of drugs with efficacy against 
clinical isolates that have emerged recently and also underlined the importance 
of targeting a specific pathogen.