A New Triterpenoid Saponin from the Tropical Marine Sponge Lipastrotethya sp.

: Marine sponges have been a remarkably rich source of pharmacologically active and structurally diverse natural products. As a part of our continuing search for novel secondary metabolites of biomedical importance from marine invertebrate, we encountered the sponge Lipastrotethya sp. from Chuuk, Micronesia. The crude organic extract of this animal exhibited considerable cytotoxicity against the K562 cell line. Guided by the 1 H NMR analysis, flash chromatography of the crude extract followed by HPLC yielded a new triterpene glycoside, along with ten known saponins of the sarasinoside class. The structure of this new compound was determined by combined spectroscopic methods such as COSY, HSQC and HMBC experiment. Among these metabolites, six compounds exhibited moderate cytotoxicity against ACHN, MDA-MB-231, NCI-H23 and NUGC-3 cell lines.