Abstract
Sponges are prolific producers of specialized metabolites with unique structural scaffolds. Their chemical diversity has always inspired natural product chemists working in drug discovery. As part of their metabolic filter-feeding activities, sponges are known to release molecules, possibly including their specialized metabolites. These released "Exo-Metabolites" (EMs) may be considered as new chemical reservoirs that could be collected from the water column while preserving marine biodiversity. The present work aims to determine the proportion and diversity of specialized EMs released by the sponge Aplysina cavernicola (Vacelet 1959). This Mediterranean sponge produces bromo-spiroisoxazoline alkaloids that are widely distributed in the Aplysinidae family. Aquarium experiments were designed to facilitate a continuous concentration of dissolved and diluted metabolites from the seawater around the sponges. Mass Spectrometry (MS)-based metabolomics combined with a dereplication pipeline were performed to investigate the proportion and identity of brominated alkaloids released as EMs. Chemometric analysis revealed that brominated features represented 12% of the total sponge's EM features. Consequently, a total of 13 bromotyrosine alkaloids were reproducibly detected as EMs. The most abundant ones were aerothionin, purealidin L, aerophobin 1, and a new structural congener, herein named aplysine 1. Their structural identity was confirmed by NMR analyses following their isolation. MS-based quantification indicated that these major brominated EMs represented up to 1.0 ± 0.3% w/w of the concentrated seawater extract. This analytical workflow and collected results will serve as a stepping stone to characterize the composition of A. cavernicola's EMs and those released by other sponges through in situ experiments, leading to further evaluate the biological properties of such EMs.