Nostodione A, a Novel Mitotic Spindle Poison from a Blue-Green Alga Nostoc commune

Abstract

A novel antimitotic compound named Nostodione A (Nd A) was isolated from a terrestrial blue-green alga Nostoc commune. Nostodione A disturbed the mitotic spindle formation of sea-urchin eggs and gave small spindles with low birefringence density. Nostodione A. how­ever, had no phytotoxicity on the germination of a dicotyledonous plant Medicago sativa. Based on the spectral analysis and chemical degradation, the structure of Nostodione A was elucidated