Pentacyclic Antibiotics from a Tidal Mud Flat-Derived Actinomycete

The combination of investigating a unique source of chemically prolific bacterium with an LC/MS-based bacterial strain selection approach resulted in the discovery of two new secondary metabolites, buanmycin (1) and buanquinone (2), from the culture of a marine Streptomyces strain, which was isolated from a tidal mudflat in Buan, Republic of Korea. The carbon backbone of buanmycin (1), comprising 20 quaternary carbons out of 30 total carbons, was determined via 13C–13C COSY NMR analysis after labeling 1 with 13C by culturing the bacterium with 13C-glucose. The complete structure of 1 was confidently elucidated, primarily based on 1D and 2D NMR spectroscopic and X-ray crystallographic analysis, as that of a new pentacyclic xanthone. The absolute configuration of the α-methyl serine unit in 1 was established by applying the advanced Marfey’s method. The structure of buanquinone (2) was determined to be a new pentacyclic quinone based on NMR and MS spectroscopic data. Buanmycin exhibited potent cytotoxicity against colorectal carcinoma cells (HCT-116) and gastric carcinoma cells (SNU-638) with submicromolar IC50 values and strongly inhibited the pathogenic Gram-negative bacterium Salmonella enterica (MIC = 0.7 μM). In particular, buanmycin demonstrated inhibition of sortase A, which is a promising target for antibiotic discovery.