Abstract
Bioactivity-guided fractionation of an alcohol extract of the soft coral Sarcophyton sp. collected from the intertidal areas and the fringing coral reefs near Hurghada, Red Sea, Egypt afforded a new lactone cembrane diterpene, sarcophytolide 1. The structure was deduced based on its spectroscopic data and from comparison with the spectral data of known closely related cembrane-type compounds. This compound exhibits good antimicrobial activity towards Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Candida albicans, and Saccharomyces cerevisiae activity.