Novel Marine Phenazines as Potential Cancer Chemopreventive and Anti-Inflammatory Agents

Two new (1 and 2) and one known phenazine derivative (lavanducyanin, 3) were isolated and identified from the fermentation broth of a marine-derived Streptomyces sp. (strain CNS284). In mammalian cell culture studies, compounds 1, 2 and 3 inhibited TNF-α-induced NFκB activity (IC50 values of 4.1, 24.2, and 16.3 μM, respectively) and LPS-induced nitric oxide production (IC50 values of >48.6, 15.1, and 8.0 μM, respectively). PGE2 production was blocked with greater efficacy (IC50 values of 7.5, 0.89, and 0.63 μM, respectively), possibly due to inhibition of cyclooxygenases in addition to the expression of COX-2. Treatment of cultured HL-60 cells led to dose-dependent accumulation in the subG1 compartment of the cell cycle, as a result of apoptosis. These data provide greater insight on the biological potential of phenazine derivatives, and some guidance on how various substituents may alter potential anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer effects

Secondary Metabolites of Marine Microbes: From Natural Products Chemistry to Chemical Ecology

Marine natural products (MNPs) exhibit a wide range of pharmaceutically relevant bioactivities, including antibiotic, antiviral, anticancer, or anti-inflammatory properties. Besides marine macroorganisms such as sponges, algae, or corals, specifically marine bacteria and fungi have shown to produce novel secondary metabolites (SMs) with unique and diverse chemical structures that may hold the key for the development of novel drugs or drug leads. Apart from highlighting their potential benefit to humankind, this review is focusing on the manifold functions of SMs in the marine ecosystem. For example, potent MNPs have the ability to exile predators and competing organisms, act as attractants for mating purposes, or serve as dye for the expulsion or attraction of other organisms. A large compilation of literature on the role of MNPs in marine ecology is available, and several reviews evaluated the function of MNPs for the aforementioned topics. Therefore, we focused the second part of this review on the importance of bioactive compounds from crustose coralline algae (CCA) and their role during coral settlement, a topic that has received less attention. It has been shown that certain SMs derived from CCA and their associated bacteria are able to induce attachment and/or metamorphosis of many benthic invertebrate larvae, including globally threatened reef-building scleractinian corals. This review provides an overview on bioactivities of MNPs from marine microbes and their potential use in medicine as well as on the latest findings of the chemical ecology and settlement process of scleractinian corals and other invertebrate larvae

Synthesis of the unusual product of the photolysis of 6-methoxybenzofuran-2,3-dione and styrene

1269-127

An efficient synthesis of lactarochromal from 6-amino-2,2-dimethylchroman-4-one

1761-1762Lactarochromal 1, a metabolite of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Lactarius deliciosus, has been synthesised starting from 6-amino-2,2-dimethylchroman-4-one 3, which in turn, is prepared from paracetamol via the known intermediates. The amino compound <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal">3 is then converted to the iodo compound <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal">4, followed by formylation of the latter using N-formylpiperidine to provide, efficiently, the natural product <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal">1 in good yield

A new glycolipid and a new monohydroxy sterol from <i>Cladiella</i> species of Andaman and Nicobar Islands

405-409The less polar fractions of hexane-ethyl acetate solubles of Cladiella species yield a new monohydroxy sterol 1 and a new lipid glycoside 4 from more polar fractions of ethyl acetate solubles. The structure of the new glycolipid has been deduced as 2-hydroxy-3-(octadecyloxy)-propyl-β--arabinopyranoside 4 from its spectral data