Imidazole Alkaloids and Their Zinc Complexes from the Calcareous Marine Sponge Leucetta chagosensis

Five new imidazole derivatives (1–5), together with eight related known alkaloids, were isolated from a calcareous marine sponge, Leucetta chagosensis, collected from the South China Sea. Their structures were fully characterized by spectroscopic methods. Structurally, 1 possesses an unusual skeleton featuring imidazole and oxazolone rings linked via a nitrogen atom, whereas 2 bears an intriguing guanylurea-substituted imidazole ring. Compounds 4 and 5 were identified as zinc complexes; they represent the metal complex analogues of naamidine J (6) and pyronaamidine (7), respectively. Among the isolated compounds, 2 and 5 showed significant inhibitory activities toward the LPS-induced production of IL-6 in the human acute monocytic leukemia cell line THP-1, and 7 displayed cytotoxicity against MCF-7, PC9, A549, and breast cancer stem cells (MCF-7-Oct4-GFP) with IC50 values of 5.2, 5.6, 7.8, and 10 μM, respectively.