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Evaluation of the Biological Potential of an Endophytic Fusarium equiseti from Pancratium maritimum Supported by Metabolic Profiling and Molecular Docking
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DOI：10.3390/microorganisms14081773.png)
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Abstract
En 中文
Endophytic fungi are promising sources of chemically diverse metabolites. Fusarium species exhibit diverse biological roles, ranging from beneficial applications to detrimental effects, including plant diseases and mycotoxin production. A few reports have investigated Fusarium equiseti bioactivity, but no reports have evaluated its anti-inflammatory potential. In the present study, the ethyl acetate (EtOAc) extract obtained from an endophytic F. equiseti, isolated for the first time from the bulb of Pancratium maritimum L., was evaluated for its in vitro antioxidant, cytotoxic, anti-acetyl- and butyrylcholinesterases, and anti-inflammatory activities. The extract was chemically profiled by LC-MS/MS, evaluated in complementary antioxidant and cytotoxicity screens, and assessed for inhibition of nitric oxide (NO) production in lipopolysaccharide-stimulated RAW264.7 macrophages. In addition, putatively annotated metabolites were further examined by molecular docking against inducible nitric oxide synthase (iNOS), as a promising biological activity providing a target directly aligned with the NO-based assay. The EtOAc extract showed total phenolics content of 29.31 mg GAE/g and a total alkaloid content of 8.43 mg AE/g, with a DPPH radical scavenging IC50 value of 2.18 mg/mL. Cytotoxicity assessment against the RAW264.7 cell line revealed an IC50 value of 49.95 μg/mL, while the Artemia salina lethality assay yielded an LC50 value of 1.86 mg/mL. Notably, the extract demonstrated potent anti-inflammatory activity through nitric oxide inhibition, with an IC50 value of 4.70 μg/mL compared with 18.46 μg/mL for quercetin. LC-MS/MS analysis offered the tentative identification of 31 metabolites in the extract. Docking against iNOS identified fusarioxazin as the highest-scoring ligand (−8.8 kcal/mol), although these computational predictions require experimental validation with purified compounds. The data identify suppression of macrophage NO production as the principal bioactivity of the crude F. equiseti TU-64 extract. Collectively, these findings highlight the potential of endophytic F. equiseti as a promising source of bioactive metabolites for the development of natural therapeutic agents.
Keywords:
<i>Fusarium equiseti</i>
<i>Pancratium maritimum</i> L.
LC-MS/MS
Anti-inflammatory
inducible nitric oxide synthase
molecular docking
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