Identification and analysis of the whole genome of the marine-derived fungus Penicillium brasilianum HBU-136 revealed the presence of an interesting biosynthetic gene cluster (BGC) for non-ribosomal peptide synthetases (NRPS), highly homologous to the BGCs of indole-diketopiperazine derivatives. With the aid of genomic analysis, eight indole-diketopiperazines (1-8), including three new compounds, spirotryprostatin G (1), and cyclotryprostatins F and G (2 and 3), were obtained by large-scale cultivation of the fungal strain HBU-136 using rice medium with 1.0% MgCl2. The absolute configurations of 1-3 were determined by comparison of their experimental electronic circular dichroism (ECD) with calculated ECD spectra. Selective cytotoxicities were observed for compounds 1 and 4 against HL-60 cell line with the IC50 values of 6.0 and 7.9 μM, respectively, whereas 2, 3, and 5 against MCF-7 cell line with the IC50 values of 7.6, 10.8, and 5.1 μM, respectively.
Keywords: Penicillium brasilianum; biosynthetic gene cluster (BGC); cytotoxicities; indole-diketopiperazine.