bioprospecting 
noun [mass noun]
The search for plant and animal species from which medicinal drugs and other commercially valuable compounds can be obtained.Many pharmaceutical companies are currently engaged in bioprospecting, which consists of testing plant species for potentially useful compounds, sometimes signing agreements with national governments for permission....
- While traditional communities worldwide struggle to catch up with the implications of bioprospecting and biopiracy, technological advances are further removing them from the equation.
- Most people believe that bioprospecting is limited to pharmaceuticals, but it isn't.
Derivatives
bioprospector
- Today bioprospectors working for biotech firms, pharmaceutical and agribusiness giants are off to the far corners of the earth hoping to come back with the goods.
- Critics contend, however, that in negotiations between bioprospectors and local people - especially indigenous groups the playing field is far from level.
- There were bioprospectors among us in Kamchatka.
Origin
1990s: from bio(diversity) prospecting.