Center for Marine Biotechnology and Biomedicine, Scripps Institution of Oceanography, University of California-San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093-0204, USA.
Cultivation of an obligate marine Streptomyces strain has furnished the marinopyrroles A and B, densely halogenated, axially chiral metabolites that contain an uncommon bispyrrole structure. X-ray analysis of marinopyrrole B showed that the natural product exists as an atropo-enantiomer with the M-configuration. Though configurationally stable at room temperature, M-(-)-marinopyrrole A can be racemized at elevated temperatures to yield the non-natural P-(+)-atropo-enantiomer. The marinopyrroles possess potent antibiotic activities against methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus.