Biological Importance of Marine Algae

Abstract

Marine organisms are potentially prolific sources of highly bioactive secondary metabolites that might represent useful leads in the development of new pharmaceutical agents. Algae can be classified into two main groups; first one is the microalgae, which includes blue green algae, dinoflagellates, bacillariophyta (diatoms).. . etc., and second one is macroalgae (seaweeds) which includes green, brown and red algae. The microalgae phyla have been recognized to provide chemical and pharmacological novelty and diversity. Moreover, microalgae are considered as the actual producers of some highly bioactive compounds found in marine resources. Red algae are considered as the most important source of many biologically active metabolites in comparison to other algal classes. Seaweeds are used for great number of application by man. The principal use of seaweeds as a source of human food and as a source of gums (phycocollides). Phycocolloides like agar agar, alginic acid and carrageenan are primarily constituents of brown and red algal cell walls and are widely used in industry.

Anti-inflammatory and antinociceptive activities of methanolic extract from red seaweed Dichotomaria obtusata

“…Red seaweeds are considered the most important source of many biologically active me tabolites in comparison to other algal classes (El Gamal, 2010). As a first step toward identifying the major chemical groups present in D. obtusata, we have developed a qualitative chemical study of its composition.…”

“…A group of inhibitors of phospholipase A 2 were isolated from different microalgae (Mayer et al, 1993). Recently, other metabolites with antiinflammatory activity have been obtained from seaweeds, including a glycosterol (Awad, 2000), a phlorotannin (Sugiura et al, 2006), polyphenols (Jung et al, 2009;El Gamal, 2010) and polysaccharides (Ananthi et al, 2010). Moreover, various seaweeds have antinociceptive properties (Anca et al, 1993;Guzmán et al, 2001;Viana et al, 2002).…”

Controlling of Microbial Growth by Using Cystoseira barbata Extract

“…Marine organisms are sources of bioactive secondary metabolites with potent use in the development of new pharmaceutical agents (Abedin &Taha, 2008;Abdel-Raouf et al, 2008 andEL-Gamal, 2010). Kuniyoshi et al (1985) reported that, diphenyl ether extracted from the green alga Cladophora fascicularis was found to inhibit the growth of Escherichia coli, Bacillus subtilis and Staphylococcus aureus.…”

Cosmeceuticals Derived from Bioactive Substances Found in Marine Algae

“…Marine macroalgae are a rich source of various phenolic antioxidant compounds [35][36][37][38][39]. These compounds exhibit a wide range of physiological properties, such as anti-allergenic, anti-artherogenic, anti-inflammatory, anti-microbial, anti-thrombotic, cardioprotective, vasodilatory, and antioxidant effects [1,36,37,40,41]. Structurally, phenolic compounds comprise an aromatic ring, bearing one or more hydroxyl substituents, and range from simple phenolic molecules to highly polymerized compounds [42].…”

“…Recent studies have demonstrated that the protective effect against oxidative stress induced by ROS and UV radiation is connected to the number and position of hydrogen-donating hydroxyl groups on the aromatic ring of the phenolic molecules, and is also affected by the other factors, such as other H-donating groups (-NH, -SH). Therefore, since dieckol has more hydroxyl groups than other phlorotannins it should be effective as an anti-oxidant for use in cosmeceutical products [1,40,49].…”