Establishment of long-term preservation for dimethyl sulfide by the solid-phase microextraction method.

Dimethyl sulfide (DMS) derived from marine biological activity affects radiative forcing of the climate. The general analytical technique for DMS in seawater (purge and trap analytical method, P&T) is complex onboard ship. Thus it is difficult to obtain sufficient data for a comprehensive understanding of the spatiotemporal variability of DMS in the sea surface layer. On the other hand, a new analytical method for DMS using SPME (solid-phase microextraction) has recently been developed as an alternative method to P&T. This method is simpler than P&T because no special or complex apparatus is needed. If it is possible to preserve DMS for an extended period in excess of the duration of the cruise, the SPME method is a promising method for measuring DMS in seawater. We assessed an analytical method which can allow us to preserve DMS on the long-term scale using SPME. In liquid nitrogen (-196 degrees C), as preserved environment, for a period of 20 days after sampling, we found the preservation rate of DMS to be 94.7 +/- 4.4% (n = 6) in this study. Furthermore, estimating the distribution coefficient with respect to the effect of salinity on SPME, we found that DMS changed by 0.1 nM/% sal, suggesting that salinity has only a minor influence on oceanic DMS measurements in the open ocean because the minimal change of the open ocean salinity is within 2 %. Applying the SPME method to open ocean samples, we found that there were no significant differences in DMS between the unpreserved and preserved samples (r = 0.99, n = 26, SE = 0.01, p < 0.0001), showing the SPME method has potential for use for open ocean surveys.

Biosynthesis and transformation of homoanatoxin-a in the cyanobacterium Raphidiopsis mediterranea Skuja and structures of three new homologues.

The biosynthetic origin of the C-12 methyl group in homoanatoxin-a (1) was identified by the feeding experiment of L-[methyl-13C]-methionine in the culture of the cyanobacterium Raphidiopsis mediterranea Skuja strain LBRI 48. Remarkably high incorporation (80%) of 13C was observed at C-12. The in vivo enzymatic transformation of 1 was also examined by the prolonged culture of strain LBRI 48. The cells harvested at the stationary phase (15 days of incubation) gave higher contents of 4S-hydroxyhomoanatoxin-a (2), 4R-hydroxyhomoanatoxin-a (3), 2,3-epoxyhomoanatoxin-a (4), and 4-ketohomoanatoxin-a (5) than those from the cells collected at the late logarithmic growth phase (5 days). Compounds 2-5 would be transformed from 1 in the cells. The ratio of anatoxin-a and 1 was not significantly changed between two phases. Compound 5 was generated from 1 by air oxidation during storage even under dry and cool (-30 degrees C) conditions, but the oxidation was prevented in a water solution at both room temperature and -30 degrees C (frozen stock). Homoanatoxin-a (1) gave 2,3-dihydro-3-methoxyhomoanatoxin-a (6) during the separation procedures probably by the Michael reaction of methanol used as solvent. It should be noted that 4 was isolated for the first time from a cyanobacterium as the natural product. Compounds 3 and 5 were new members of the anatoxins.