Abstract

Coral boringAka diagonoxea thomas 1968 (porifera: phloeodictyidae) fromIndianOcean with antifungal property

Author(s): Vijai Lakshmi, PraveenKumar Shukla

This paper focuses on antifungal property of Aka dionoxea Thomas1968 boring coral of the Indian Ocean. This is the first time that a species of the genus Aka has been reported from the Indian Ocean showed antifungal property. Drug from marine resources is an area which offers an unprecedented opportunity for their pharmacological exploration and hence has received great attention during recent years for natural product chemistry, a promising new area of study. Thirty percent of all potential new natural drugs have been isolated from marine animals. About 75% of the recently registered and patented material to fight cancer comes from sponges. The methanol extract of the sponge showed promising antifungal activity against Candida albicans and Candida neoformans (MIC 62.5 µg/ml) Sporothrix schenckii (MIC 250 µg/ml), Trichophyton mentagrophytes (MIC 62.5 µg /ml), Aspergillus fumigatus (MIC 125 µg /ml), Candida parapsilosis (MIC 62.5 µg/ml).