Roseopurpurins: Chemical Diversity Enhanced by Convergent Biosynthesis and Forward and Reverse Michael Additions.

Cultures of the estuarine fungus Penicillium roseopurpureum (CMB-MF038) yielded a diverse array of polyketides, many of which were related via a highly convergent biosynthetic pathway. In addition to revising and assigning structures, and documenting chemical and biological properties, pro-drug cytotoxic properties were attributed to roseopurpurins H (10) and I (11) on the basis of in situ reverse Michael addition to a cytotoxic Michael acceptor (12). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]