CELL LOCALIZATION OF PHARM BIOACTIVE METABOLITES IN MARINE SPONGES & ASCIDIANS

海绵和海鞘已被证明是一个巨大的来源 药理生物活性次生代谢物。对新技术的需求 治疗疾病的药物继续鼓励研究 用于分离和表征新的天然产物。我们 对确定细胞的精确定位很感兴趣 这些化合物有助于了解细胞的基本过程 代谢途径、生物学和生态功能。的作用 次生代谢物中伴生的微生物和藻类共生体 还将研究生产情况。这类化合物被称为 吡啶类化合物是许多生物医学和化学领域的研究对象。 由于它们的高生物活性，有趣的杂环 结构和跨种属的分布。我们发现， 其中一些化合物经历了特征性的颜色变化， 可见光和荧光发射中的pH值变化。我们 建议在使用激光扫描时将此功能用作标记 激光共聚焦显微镜研究细胞定位的实验研究 海绵和海鞘组织中的吡哆吖啶类化合物。各种海绵和 之前已经确定化学成分的海鞘样本是 用共聚焦显微镜检查以确定 利用这种方法作为研究细胞定位的一种手段 它们的次生代谢物。一旦找到了一个好的候选人， 发展了不同的染色方法来研究 化合物在特定细胞内的定位。这些研究的结果 研究将指导未来的样本收集和保存 涉及共聚焦显微镜的持续研究的程序 方法海洋天然产物化学。这样做的结果 研究也将影响测试方法的发展 地方性次生菌的生物学和生态功能 海洋无脊椎动物的代谢物。这个项目接近于 已经完成，手稿正在准备中。

Marine sponges and ascidians have proven to be a vast source of pharmacologically bioactive secondary metabolites. The need for new drugs for the treatment of diseases continutes to encourage research forthe isolation and characterization of novel natural products. We are interested in determining the precise cellular localization of these compounds to understand the basic cellular processes of metabolic pathways, biological, and ecological function. The role of associated microbial and algal symbionts in secondary metabolite production will also be studied. The class of compounds known as the pyridoacridines has been the subject of much biomedical and chemical interest due to their high bioactivity, interesting heterocyclic structures, and transphylogenic distributrion. We have found that some of these compounds undergo a characteristic color change with a change in pH in both visible light and fluorescence emmision. We propose to utilize this feature as a marker while using laser scanning confocal microscopy to study the cellular localization of pyridoacridines in sponge and ascidian tissues. Various sponge and ascidian samples whose chemistry has been previously determined were examined using confocal microscopy to determine the feasibility of utilizing this method as a means of studying the cellular localization of their secondary metabolites. Once a good candidate was found, differential staining methods were developed to investigate the localization of compounds within specific cells. The results of these studies will direct future sample collection and preservation procedures for continued research involving confocal microscopy methods in marine natural products chemistry. The results of this research will aso influence the development of methods to test the biological and ecological functions of the localized secondary metabolites from marine invertebrates. This project is near to completion and a manuscript is in preparation.