Diketopiperazines from Marine Actinomycetes

Abstract

Diketopiperazines (DKPs) are a class of cyclic compounds that result from peptide bonds between two amino acids to form a lactam and are widespread as metabolites of various bacteria and fungi. Diketopiperazines possess powerful and useful biological activities including anticancer and antimicrobial activities. As marine environmental conditions are extremely different from terrestrial ones, it is surmised that marine actinomycetes have different characteristics from those of terrestrial counterparts and, therefore, might produce different types of bioactive compounds.In our ongoing research to develop the biomedical potential of marine actinomycetes, we isolated several diketopiperazines from the fermentation broth of a marine actinomycetes. The isolation, structure determination, and biological activities of diketopiperazines from marine actinomycetes will be presented.