Ulva and Enteromorpha are cosmopolitan and familiar marine algal genera. It is well known that these green macroalgae lose their natural morphology during short-term cultivation under aseptic conditions and during long-term cultivation in nutrient-added seawater and adopt an unusual form instead. These phenomena led to the belief that undefined morphogenetic factors that were indispensable to the foliaceous morphology of macroalgae exist throughout the oceans. We characterize a causative factor, named thallusin, isolated from an epiphytic marine bacterium. Thallusin induces normal germination and morphogenesis of green macroalgae.

Many green algae cannot develop normally when they are grown under axenic conditions. Monostroma oxyspermum, for example, proliferates unicellularly in an aseptic culture, but develops into a normal foliaceous gametophyte in the presence of some marine bacteria. More than 1000 bacterial strains were isolated from marine algae and sponges and assayed for their ability to induce the morphogenesis of unicellular M. oxyspermum. Fifty bacterial strains exhibiting morphogenesis-inducing activity against unicellular M. oxyspermum were isolated. The partial gyrB (approximately 1.2 kbp) and 16S rDNA (approximately 1.4 kbp) sequences of about 40 active strains were determined, and their phylogenetic relationships were analysed. All these strains were located within the Cytophaga-Flavobacterium-Bacteroides (CFB) complex, and most of these strains were clustered in a clade comprising Zobellia uliginosa. On the other hand, these bacteria also exhibited morphogenetic activity against germ-free spores of Ulva pertusa, Ulva conglobata and Enteromorpha intestinalis. Moreover, these bacteria induced the release of spores from the leafy young gametophyte of M. oxyspermum. These results indicate that strains belonging to several groups in the CFB complex play an important role in the normal development of green algae in the marine coastal environment.

We isolated three orange or yellow pigment-producing marine bacteria, strains 04OKA-13-27 (MBIC08261), 04OKA-17-12 (MBIC08260), and YM6-073 (MBIC06409), off the coast of Okinawa Prefecture in Japan. These strains were classified as novel species of the family Flavobacteriaceae based on their 16S rRNA gene sequence. They were cultured, and the major carotenoids produced were purified by chromatographic methods. Their structures were determined by spectral data to be (3R)-saproxanthin (strain 04OKA-13-27), (3R,2'S)-myxol (strain YM6-073), and (3R,3'R)-zeaxanthin (strains YM6-073 and 04OKA-17-12). Saproxanthin and myxol, which are monocyclic carotenoids rarely found in nature, demonstrated significant antioxidative activities against lipid peroxidation in the rat brain homogenate model and a neuro-protective effect from L-glutamate toxicity.

A new cytotoxic substance named mechercharmycin A was isolated from marine-derived Thermoactinomyces sp. YM3-251. The structure of mechercharmycin A was determined by an X-ray crystallographic analysis to be cyclic peptide-like and bearing four oxazoles and a thiazole. Mechercharmycin B, a linear congener of mechercharmycin A, was also isolated from the same bacterium. Mechercharmycin A exhibited relatively strong antitumor activity, whereas mechercharmycin B exhibited almost no such activity.