Bioactive Natural Products from Soft Corals

Dear Colleagues,                

Marine organisms are regarded as very important producers for bioactive natural products. Among these organisms, soft corals are the second most prolific source of marine natural products, next to sponges. Compared to stony corals, soft corals do not produce calcium carbonate skeletons. Although rare peptide-type and proteinaceous metabolites have been discovered, they biosynthesize abundant natural products with unique carbon skeletons, including fatty acids, steroids, and terpenoids as the main types of secondary metabolite produced. These metabolites can defend the host organisms against predators, fight diseases, and prevent the fouling and overgrowth of other organisms. The discoveries of lemnalol and clavulones in the 1980s and cembranolides before and up to the 1980s make soft corals the attractive targets for new drug development. In addition, metabolites from Pseudopterogorgia elisabethae and Briareum excavatum have been found to demonstrate attracting anti-inflammatory effects. Furthermore, the discovery of austrasulfone and its synthesized derivative dihydroaustrasulfone alcohol exhibit not only anti-inflammatory activity, but the latter compound could potentially exhibit therapeutic ability in the treatment of neuropathic pain, atherosclerosis, and multiple sclerosis. Therefore, natural products from soft corals have been considered to be medicinally important and could be beneficial to human health.

The goal of this Special Issue is to provide a platform for scientists of related fields to share and report the discovery and development of bioactive natural products from soft corals. We invite researchers of this field all over the world to publish original research and review articles in this Special Issue. Potential topics include but are not limited to:

• Soft coral natural products as antifouling agents;
• Soft coral natural products as anti-inflammatory agents;
• Soft coral natural products as anticancer agents;
• Soft coral natural products as antiviral agents;
• Soft coral natural products for fighting diseases.

Prof. Dr. Jyh-Horng Sheu
Prof. Dr. Yuan-Bin Cheng
Guest Editors

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