Abstract This review covers the recent history of a series of very important natural products and their derivatives that are currently in use or under evaluation in the areas of anti-infectives, important cancer treatments that include antibody drug conjugates, followed by a discussion of type 2 diabetes (T2DM) drugs and angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors. The current structures of the agents are shown, though in the case of some peptides used in T2DM drugs the standard single letter abbreviation for an amino acid is used.