Medicinal Plant Endophytes Produce Analogous Bioactive Compounds

Endophytic fungi from medicinal plants are potential sources of the bioactive medicinal compounds. We isolated 193 endophytic isolates from 360 tissue fragments from the Chinese medicinal plant species Camptotheca cuminata, Gastrodia elata and Pinellia ternata. Forty-two taxa were identified based on morphological traits and internal transcribed spacer (ITS) rDNA sequence analysis and comprised 33 Ascomycota, four Basidiomycota and five Mucoromycotina. All the fungal strains were screened for bioactive-compound production by submerged culture. Three taxa isolated from Camptotheca cuminata produced camptothecin with relatively high yields. Colletotrichum gloeosporioides (strain XSXY05) from Camptotheca cuminata produced 10-hydroxycamptothecin with yields of 24 mu g per gram of myceliium. Three taxa isolated from Gastrodia elata produced gastrodin with yields of 57, 89, 184 mu g per gram of myceliium, respectively, while three taxa from Pinellia ternata produced ephedrine hydrochloride, though in relatively low amounts. Both gastrodin and ephedrine hydrochloride are potentially valuable for pharmacological utilization. All bioactive-compound were located in the ground hypha of the isolates and not in the culture broth.