Total Synthesis of Lugdunomycin via Sequential Photoinduced Spiroketalization and Isobenzofuran Diels-Alder Reactions

The presence of sterically rigid contiguous quaternary stereocenters in natural products imposes conformational constraints with significant effects on their biological activities. However, achieving the direct synthesis of multiple contiguous quaternary stereocenters in a single step remains a formidable challenge. Here, we present the total synthesis of the antibacterial metabolite lugdunomycin (1) in thirteen steps via a sequence of photochemical transformations. A photoenolization, keto-enol tautomerization, and spiroketalization sequence was developed to generate the spiroketal 4 from actinaphthoran B (3). Subsequently, a photoinduced isobenzofuran Diels-Alder reaction between elmonin (4) and iso-maleimycin (5) was developed to construct the polycyclic benzaza[4,3,3]propellane framework bearing three contiguous quaternary stereocenters in the compact C-ring along with a distal hydroxyl group at C19. The mechanism of these photochemical reactions was investigated using synthetic and computational approaches.

Bioactive Angucyclines/Angucyclinones Discovered from 1965 to 2023

Angucyclines/angucyclinones, a class of polyketides with diverse chemical structures, display various bioactivities including antibacterial or antifungal, anticancer, anti-neuroinflammatory, and anti-α-glucosidase activities. Marine and terrestrial microorganisms have made significant contributions to the discovery of bioactive angucyclines/angucyclinones. This review covers 283 bioactive angucyclines/angucyclinones discovered from 1965 to 2023, and the emphasis is on the biological origins, chemical structures, and biological activities of these interesting natural products.

Atypical Angucyclinones with Ring Expansion and Cleavage from a Marine Streptomyces sp

A unique ring C-expanded angucyclinone, oxemycin A (1), and seven new ring-cleavage derivatives (2-5 and 9-11) were isolated from the marine actinomycete Streptomyces pratensis KCB-132, together with eight known analogues (6-8 and 12-16). Their structures were elucidated by spectroscopic analyses, single-crystal X-ray diffractions, and NMR and ECD calculations. Among these atypical angucyclinones, compound 1 represented the first seven-membered ketoester in the angucyclinone family, which sheds light on the origin of fragmented angucyclinones with C-ring cleavage at C-12/C-12a in the Baeyer-Villiger hypothesis, such as 2-4, while the related "nonoxidized" analogues 5-8 seem to originate from a diverse pathway within the Grob fragmentation hypothesis. Additionally, we have succeeded in the challenging separation of elmenols E and F (12) into their four stereoisomers, which remained stable in aprotic solvents but rapidly racemized under protic conditions. Furthermore, the absolute configurations of LS1924 and its isomers (14 and 15) were assigned by ECD calculations for the first time. Surprisingly, these two bicyclic acetals are susceptible to hydrolysis in solution, resulting in fragmented derivatives 17 and 18 with C-ring cleavage between C-6a and C-7. Compared with ring C-modified angucyclinones, ring A-cleaved 11 was more active to multiple resistant "ESKAPE" pathogens with MIC values ranging from 4.7 to 37.5 μg/mL.

Natural Enantiomers: Occurrence, Biogenesis and Biological Properties

The knowledge that natural products (NPs) are potent and selective modulators of important biomacromolecules (e.g., DNA and proteins) has inspired some of the world's most successful pharmaceuticals and agrochemicals. Notwithstanding these successes and despite a growing number of reports on naturally occurring pairs of enantiomers, this area of NP science still remains largely unexplored, consistent with the adage "If you don't seek, you don't find". Statistically, a rapidly growing number of enantiomeric NPs have been reported in the last several years. The current review provides a comprehensive overview of recent records on natural enantiomers, with the aim of advancing awareness and providing a better understanding of the chemical diversity and biogenetic context, as well as the biological properties and therapeutic (drug discovery) potential, of enantiomeric NPs.

Ring D-Modified and Highly Reduced Angucyclinones From Marine Sediment-Derived Streptomyces sp

Angucyclines and angucyclinones represent the largest family of type II PKS-engineered natural products. Chemical analysis of a marine Streptomyces sp. KCB-132 yielded three new members, actetrophenone A (1) and actetrophenols A–B (2–3). Their structures were elucidated by NMR spectroscopy, X-ray crystallography and CD calculations. Actetrophenone A (1) is the first representative of a novel-type angucyclinone bearing a nonaromatic D-ring. Actetrophenol A (2) features a highly reduced and aromatized four-ring system, which is unprecedented for natural products. While (R_a)- and (S_a)-actetrophenol B (3) bear an unprecedented N-acetyltryptamine-substituted tetraphene core skeleton, this is the first report of a pair of atropisomeric isomers in the angucyclinone family. Actetrophenol A (2) exhibits remarkable antibiotic activity, notably including potent activity to multiple resistant Staphylococcus aureus and Enterococcus faecium with MIC values of 4 μg/ml, in contrast, the positive control antimicrobial agent penicillin was inactive up to 32 μg/ml.

Research Progress in Anti-Inflammatory Bioactive Substances Derived from Marine Microorganisms, Sponges, Algae, and Corals

Inflammation is the body's defense reaction in response to stimulations and is the basis of various physiological and pathological processes. However, chronic inflammation is undesirable and closely related to the occurrence and development of diseases. The ocean gives birth to unique and diverse bioactive substances, which have gained special attention and been a focus for anti-inflammatory drug development. So far, numerous promising bioactive substances have been obtained from various marine organisms such as marine bacteria and fungi, sponges, algae, and coral. This review covers 71 bioactive substances described during 2015-2020, including the structures (65 of which), species sources, evaluation models and anti-inflammatory activities of these substances. This review aims to provide some reference for the research progress of marine-organism-derived anti-inflammatory metabolites and give more research impetus for their conversion to novel anti-inflammatory drugs.

Disclosing biosynthetic connections and functions of atypical angucyclinones with a fragmented C-ring

This review on atypical angucyclinones possessing an aromatic cleavage of the C-ring covers literature between 1995 and early 2020.The unusual framework of the middle C-ring, "broken" as a result of biotransformations and oxidations in vivo and bearing an sp³-C connection, is of interest for biosynthetic investigations. The reported 39 natural compounds (55 including stereoisomers) have been analyzed and arranged into three structural groups. The biosynthetic origin of all these compounds has been thoroughly reviewed and revised, based on the found connections with oxidized angucyclinone structures. The data on biological activities has been summarized. Careful consideration of the origin of the structure allowed us to outline a hypothesis on the biological function as well as prospective applications of such atypical angucyclinones.

Marine natural products

This review covers the literature published in 2019 for marine natural products (MNPs), with 719 citations (701 for the period January to December 2019) referring to compounds isolated from marine microorganisms and phytoplankton, green, brown and red algae, sponges, cnidarians, bryozoans, molluscs, tunicates, echinoderms, mangroves and other intertidal plants and microorganisms. The emphasis is on new compounds (1490 in 440 papers for 2019), together with the relevant biological activities, source organisms and country of origin. Pertinent reviews, biosynthetic studies, first syntheses, and syntheses that led to the revision of structures or stereochemistries, have been included. Methods used to study marine fungi and their chemical diversity have also been discussed.