Abstract
Lichens are symbiotic associations of fungi with microalgae and/or cyanobacteria. Lichens belonging to the Parmeliaceae family comprise 2700 species of lichens, including the Parmotrema genus which is composed of 300 species. The metabolites of this genus include depsides, depsidones, phenolics, polysaccharides, lipids, diphenylethers and dibenzofurans, which are responsible for the biological activities reported including antidiabetic, antihelmintic, anticancer, antioxidant, antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, antimitotic, antitumoral, antifungal, and antioxidant enzyme inhibitory. Due to scarce knowledge of metabolomic profiles of Parmotrema species (P. andinum and P. robustum), a full metabolome study based on ultra-high performance liquid chromatography- diode array detector-electrospray ionization-quadrupole-orbitrap-mass-spectrometry (UHPLC-DAD-ESI-Q-orbitrap MS) was performed for a comprehensive characterization of their substances. From the methanolic extracts of these species, a total of 54 metabolites were identified for the first time using this hyphenated technique, including thirty compounds in P. andinum, and thirty-seven in P. robustum. Moreover, two compounds were not identified as known compounds, and could be new structures, according to our data. This report shows that this technique is effective and accurate for rapid chemical identification of lichen substances and the compounds identified could serve as chemotaxonomic markers to differentiate these ruffle lichens.
Highlights
IntroductionBy definition, correspond to a symbiotic association between a fungus and one or more photosynthetic autotrophic organisms that may be a green algae or a cyanobacterium, resulting in a morphologically different thallus to each of its components as a totally new morphological entity [1]
Lichens, by definition, correspond to a symbiotic association between a fungus and one or more photosynthetic autotrophic organisms that may be a green algae or a cyanobacterium, resulting in a morphologically different thallus to each of its components as a totally new morphological entity [1]Recently it was discovered that a third party, such as basidiomicete yeast, can be a componentMolecules 2017, 22, 1861; doi:10.3390/molecules22111861 www.mdpi.com/journal/moleculesMolecules 2017, 22, 1861 of lichens [2]
The compound 2-methylene-3-(R)-hydroxynonadecanoic acid was reported from P. xanthinum [5,12,13], while praesorediosic acid and protopraesorediosic acid were reported from P. praesorediosum [16,17], and methyl β-orcinolcarboxylate, atranorin, isolecanoric acid and lecanoric acid from P. tinctorum [18]
Summary
By definition, correspond to a symbiotic association between a fungus and one or more photosynthetic autotrophic organisms that may be a green algae or a cyanobacterium, resulting in a morphologically different thallus to each of its components as a totally new morphological entity [1]. Some chemical studies of Parmotrema species have been reported previously and some compounds were identified [5,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16,17,18]. The lichens Parmotrema grayana and Heterodermia obscurata were studied using high performance liquid chromatography- electrospray ionization-quadrupole-time. In a continuation of our research on the identification of lichen substances [25,26], we have selected two unstudied Parmotrema lichens for chemotaxonomic fingerprinting and describe the full comprehensive phytochemical profile of P. andinum and P. robustum for the first time, based on UHPLC-DAD coupled with high resolution electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-Q-Orbitrap-HRMS). The profiles serve as fingerprints to differentiate these lichens since the ruffle lichens are difficult to differentiate
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