title: New and highly efficient methodology for screening high-yield strains of cytotoxic deacetylmycoepoxydiene (DAM).
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To establish a highly efficient methodology for screening high yield strains of cytotoxic deacetylmycoepoxydiene (DAM), to meet the need of research on its mechanism of anti-tumor properties and in vivo toxicity studies.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A simple, sensitive, and highly repetitive screening procedure 'Antimicrobial-TLC-HPLC' (ATH) was established for the rapid obtaining of high-yielding DAM mutants to replace the time and labor intensive anti-tumor activity assay (MTT). With this ATH method, four highly yielding DAM mutants were selected out of 5000 total mutants, one of which, M4-143, showed yields of more than 300 times (250·3 mg l(-1) ) that of the parent strain A123.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The ATH method developed in this work has proven to be both economical and highly efficient with the screening of 1200 mutants in a one week time period, thusly shortening the expenditure of time and labor, without missing a single high-yield mutant. Due to these characteristics, it is superior to other HTS screening methods described in earlier literature. The mutant M4-143 has a good genetic stability and can be used for further research.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This ATH screening method is not only perfect for screening high-yield DAM mutants, but also, it is suitable to screen the strain libraries for those strains that have the ability to produce natural metabolites with antitumor activity.
authors.affiliation: Key Laboratory of the Ministry of Education for Cell Biology and Tumour Cell Engineering, School of Life Sciences, Xiamen University, Xiamen, Fujian, China.
authors.forename: W
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Huang
authors.forename: S K P
authors.initials: SK
authors.lastname: Chea
authors.forename: Z
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zheng
authors.forename: X
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Qian
authors.forename: Y
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Shen
mesh_terms: D000890:Anti-Infective Agents / Q000494:pharmacology*; D001203:Ascomycota / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics; D001419:Bacteria / Q000187:drug effects*; D001952:Bridged-Ring Compounds / Q000302:isolation & purification / Q000494:pharmacology*; D002176:Candida albicans / Q000187:drug effects*; D002851:Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid; D057166:High-Throughput Screening Assays / Q000379:methods*; D009154:Mutation; D011753:Pyrones / Q000302:isolation & purification / Q000494:pharmacology*
chemical_list: D000890:Anti-Infective Agents; D001952:Bridged-Ring Compounds; D011753:Pyrones; C476085:mycoepoxydiene