Abstract

Marine ecosystem and its organisms, particularly the invertebrates are recent targets of bioprospecting and mining for a large group of structurally unique natural products encompassing a wide variety of chemical classes such as terpenes, polyketides, acetogenins, peptides and alkaloids of varying structures, having pronounced pharmacological activities. In view of the limited reports on the antibacterials produced by bacteria, isolated from marine sponges, corals and bivalves of Indian origin, the present study is aimed at investigating the antagonistic activities of 100 heterotrophic, halophilic bacterial bionts isolated from 9 sponges, 5 corals and one bivalve. Culture broths of 46 of these bionts were active against human pathogenic bacteria namely Staphylococcus citreus, Proteus vulgaris, Serratio marcesans, Salmonella typhi, Aerobacter aerogenes and Escherichia coli. Further, the ethyl acetate extracts of cell free supernatant confirmed the presence of extracellular bioactive factor, by agar cup diffusion method. Interestingly, highest number of bionts having activity was isolated from corals followed by sponges and bivalve. The study clearly demonstrates that bacterial bionts of marine invertebrates are a rich source of bioactive secondary metabolites against human bacterial pathogens.