Menna Marialuisa

Biography

1987 Scientific collaboration agreement at the Department of Chemistry of Natural Resources, University of Naples Federico II. 1988-1991. Ph.D. scholarship for pharmacologically active natural physiology (IV cycle, three years) 1992-1994. A scholarship at the University of Venice under the project "Venetian Lagoon System", research line 3.2. "Naturalistic and chemical census and characterization of the most important flora-fauna components of the lagoon basin" (bi-annual duration). 1995-2003. University researcher at the Faculty of Pharmacy University of Naples Federico II 2003- Associate Professor at the Department of Pharmacy of the University of Naples Federico II

Research Interest

The research activity of prof. Menna, graduated from the Department of Chemistry of Natural Substances in the research group of Prof. Ernesto Fattorusso, is framed in the field of chemistry of natural marine substances of marine origin and is directed to the systematic study of the chemistry of various marine invertebrates, showing an extreme variety and complexity in their secondary metabolism. Historically, the study of secondary metabolites has been of great benefit to pharmaceutical research by providing a rich resource of structurally new bioactive molecules, many of which have become life-saving drugs or biomedical tools. About one-third of the best-selling drugs in the world are natural products or their derivatives. More than 25% of the anticancer drugs currently in use are of natural origin and another 25% come from synthetic derivatives of natural products, demonstrating that the use of natural products has so far been fundamental to the discovery of new drugs. Today, with the continuing need for new guiding compounds for the development of new drugs against a growing number of molecular "target", the availability of rich chemistry libraries is essential. The systematic study of secondary metabolites of living organisms can still give, a substantial contribution to the development of pharmaceutical sciences, as natural products offer an infinite resource of molecular diversity that is not comparable to any chemical synthesis and combinatorial chemistry collection. The analysis of molecules obtained from natural sources was initially focused on the study of terrestrial organisms. From the 60's onwards, researchers began to consider the oceans as a new and intact resource of structurally unique compounds, not surprisingly, considering that more than 60% of the earth's biosphere is ocean. The marine environment is a very rich source of plants, animals and microorganisms which, by adapting to this unique habitat, produce a wide variety of secondary metabolites other than those found in terrestrial species. It is well known that most marine compounds are produced by invertebrates such as sponges, tunicates and celenterates. The wealth of their secondary metabolites is related to the role of chemical defense played by these constituents; it is believed that this ecological function is crucial to the survival of producer organisms, which are molluscs, sedentary or slow-moving animals, lacking, in most cases, morphological defensive structures such as shells or acules. The number of new metabolites reported each year is steadily increasing, showing that the landscape of marine natural products is far from being fully explored. In addition, while early studies on sea chemistry were essentially aimed at providing an overview of the singular metabolism of marine species, of these metabolites in marine ecology but, above all, to the discovery of products that can be the driving molecules for the development of new products of pharmaceutical interest. The research activity of prof. Menna is part of this context and concerns the analysis of the chemical constituents of many species of marine invertebrates belonging to different phylum; this study has led to the isolation and determination of the structure of a large number of new molecules, most of which are structurally singular and for which a biological and / or pharmacological activity has also been highlighted. Recent research interests of prof. Menna concern essentially two issues; 1. Bioactive metabolites from tunicates. These marine invertebrates in the last fifteen years have begun to be the target of the search for many natural chemicals; this interest was stimulated both by the structural peculiarity and by the biological activity of their secondary metabolites. It should be remembered that it is just an alkaloid isolated from a tunicate, ecteinascidin 743, the natural marine product that has reached the highest level in clinical trials as an anticancer agent. In the field of this subject, prof. Menna has undertaken since 1997 a systematic study of the chemistry of the ascites of the Mediterranean, which has led to the discovery of compounds of great interest both from the point of view of the structure and the pharmacologic activity, predominantly antitumor and / or cytotoxic. 2. Active Metabolites on SPC Sponges. This topic includes studies conducted by prof. Menna on the pyrrole alkaloids characteristic of the sponges belonging to the families of porcini Agelasidae, Axinellidae, and Halichondridae. A systematic study on various species of sponges has allowed the isolation of new molecules capable of exerting a neuroprotective action by reducing the intracellular concentration of Ca 2+ and, hence, potential "lead compounds" for the development of new drugs for SNC pathologies that cause increased intracellular calcium levels such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's, multiple sclerosis and ischemia. The methodological approach, used in the work of determining the structures of the new isolated compounds and quite common to both research themes, had to take into account that, except for a few favorable cases, the metabolites studied were present in organisms only in very small quantities . Therefore, direct research into isolation, structural determination and pharmacological characterization of molecules have always been accompanied by studies aimed at improving the analytical, spectroscopic and chemical techniques necessary for this purpose. For deepening the biological and / or pharmacological activities of isolated metabolites, prof. Menna has made use of the scientific collaboration of several groups of pharmacologists and molecular biologists at the University of Naples Federico II and abroad, such as the University of Mainz in Germany and the University of Córdoba in Spain.