The lack of new antibiotics in the pharmaceutical pipeline guides more and more researchers to leave the classical isolation procedures and to look in special niches and ecosystems. Bioprospecting of extremophilic Actinobacteria through mining untapped strains and avoiding resiolation of known biomolecules is among the most promising strategies for this purpose. With this approach, members of acidtolerant, alkalitolerant, psychrotolerant, thermotolerant, halotolerant and xerotolerant Actinobacteria have been obtained from respective habitats. Among these, little survey exists on the diversity of Actinobacteria in arid areas, which are often adapted to relatively high temperatures, salt concentrations, and radiation. Therefore, arid and desert habitats are special ecosystems which can be recruited for the isolation of uncommon Actinobacteria with new metabolic capability. At the time of this writing, members of Streptomyces, Micromonospora, Saccharothrix, Streptosporangium, Cellulomonas, Amycolatopsis, Geodermatophilus, Lechevalieria, Nocardia and Actinomadura are reported from arid habitats. However, metagenomic data present dominant members of the communities in desiccating condition of areas with limited water availability that are not yet isolated. Furthermore, significant diverse types of polyketide synthase (PKS) and nonribosomal peptide synthetase (NRPS) genes are detected in xerophilic and xerotolerant Actinobacteria and some bioactive compounds are reported from them. Rather than pharmaceutically active metabolites, molecules with protection activity against drying such as Ectoin and Hydroxyectoin with potential application in industry and agriculture have also been identified from xerophilic Actinobacteria. In addition, numerous biologically active small molecules are expected to be discovered from arid adapted Actinobacteria in the future. In the current survey, the diversity and biotechnological potential of Actinobacteria obtained from arid ecosystems, along with the recent work trend on Iranian arid soils, are reported.

Bacteria have been by far the most promising resource for antibiotics in the past decades and will in all undoubtedly remain an important resource of innovative bioactive natural products in the future. Actinobacteria have been screened for many years, whereas the Myxobacteria have been underestimated in the past. Even though Actinobacteria belong to the Gram-positive and Myxobacteria to the Gram-negative bacteria both groups have a number of similar characters, as they both have huge genomes with in some cases more than 10kB and a high GC content and they both can differentiate and have often cell cycles including the formation of spores. Actinobacteria have been used for the antibiotic research for many years, hence it is often discussed whether this resource has now been exhaustively exploited but most of the screening programs from pharmaceutical companies were basing on the cultivation mainly of members of the genus Streptomyces or Streptomyces like strains (e.g., some Saccharopolyspora, Amycolatopsis or Actinomadura species) by use of standard methods so that many of the so called “neglected” Actinobacteria were overlooked the whole time. The present review gives an overview on the state of the art regarding new bioactive compounds with a focus on the marine habitats. Furthermore, the evaluation of Myxobacteria in our ongoing search for novel anti-infectives is highlighted.

A novel actinobacterium, designated ASO4wet^T, was isolated from the unidentified sponge (SO4) in the deep sea collected of the North Atlantic Ocean. Study of 16S rRNA gene sequences indicated that strain ASO4wet^T is a member of the genus Streptomyces and showed the closest similarities to Streptomyces karpasiensis K413^T (98.87 %), Streptomyces glycovorans YIM M 10366^T (98.38 %), and Streptomyces abyssalis YIM M 10400^T (97.53 %). Strain ASO4wet^T contained MK-9(H8) as the predominant menaquinone and the major fatty acids are iso-C_16:0, anteiso-C_15:0, and iso-C_15:0. Polyphasic taxonomy was carried out between strain ASO4wet^T and its phylogenetically closely related Streptomyces strains, which further elucidated their relatedness and revealed that strain ASO4wet^T could be distinguished from currently known Streptomyces species. Strain ASO4wet^T clearly represents a novel species in genus Streptomyces. We propose the name Streptomyces bathyalis sp. nov., with the type strain ASO4wet^T (= DSM 106605^T = NCCB 100657^T). Analysis of the whole-genome sequence of S. bathyalis revealed that genome size is 7,377,472 bp with 6332 coding sequences.

Two new secondary metabolites, labindole A [2-methyl-3-(2-nitroethyl)-3H-indole] (1) and labindole B [2-methyl-3-(2-nitrovinyl)-3H-indole] (2), were isolated from the myxobacterium Labilithrix luteola (DSM 27648^T). Additionally, four metabolites 3, 4, 5 and 6 already known from other sources were obtained. Their structures were elucidated from high resolution electrospray ionisation mass spectrometry (HRESIMS) and 1D and 2D nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy data and their relative configuration was assigned based on nuclear Overhauser effect (NOE) and vicinal ¹H-NMR coupling data. The compounds where tested for biological activities; labindoles A (1) and B (2) exhibited significant activity against Hepatitis C Virus, 9H-carbazole (3), 3-chloro-9H-carbazole (4) and 4-hydroxymethyl-quinoline (5) showed antifungal activities. Moreover, compound 3 had weak to moderate antibacterial activities, while labindoles A (1) and B (2) were devoid of significant antifungal and antibacterial effects.

The search for novel bioactive metabolites continues to be of much importance around the world for pharmaceutical, agricultural, and industrial applications. Actinobacteria constitute one of the extremely interesting groups of microorganisms widely used as important biological contributors for a wide range of novel secondary metabolites. This study focused on the assessment of antimicrobial and antioxidant activity of crude extracts of actinobacterial strains. Western Ghats of India represents unique regions of biologically diverse areas called “hot spots”. A total of 32 isolates were obtained from soil samples of different forest locations of Bisle Ghat and Virjapet situated in Western Ghats of Karnataka, India. The isolates were identified as species of Streptomyces, Nocardiopsis, and Nocardioides by cultural, morphological, and molecular studies. Based on preliminary screening, seven isolates were chosen for metabolites extraction and to determine antimicrobial activity qualitatively (disc diffusion method) and quantitatively (micro dilution method) and scavenging activity against DPPH (2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl) and ABTS (2,2′-Azino-bis(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) radicals. Crude extracts of all seven isolates exhibited fairly strong antibacterial activity towards MRSA strains (MRSA ATCC 33591, MRSA ATCC NR-46071, and MRSA ATCC 46171) with MIC varying from 15.62 to 125 μg/mL, whereas showed less inhibition potential towards Gram-negative bacteria Salmonella typhi (ATCC 25241) and Escherichia coli (ATCC 11775) with MIC of 125–500 μg/mL. The isolates namely S1A, SS5, SCA35, and SCA 11 inhibited Fusarium moniliforme (MTCC 6576) to a maximum extent with MIC ranging from 62.5 to 250 μg/mL. Crude extract of SCA 11 and SCA 13 exhibited potent scavenging activities against DPPH and ABTS radicals. The results from this study suggest that actinobacterial strains of Western Ghats are an excellent source of natural antimicrobial and antioxidant compounds. Further research investigations on purification, recovery, and structural characterization of the active compounds are to be carried out.