Marine organisms are a very good source of unique bioactive secondary metabolites, although they have been comparatively underexplored relative to their terrestrial counterparts. Preliminary investigation of crude extracts from the fire coral Millepora dichotoma revealed that the hemolytic potential of the MeOH extract, at a concentration of 5 mg/mL, was significantly lower at less than 5% hemolysis while DCM extract at the same concentration resulted to almost 100% hemolysis. Furthermore, antimicrobial assay revealed that the MeOH extract (5 mg/mL) mildly inhibited the fungi T. mentagrophytes and resulted in the thinning of growth of S. aureus, while DCM extracts showed no detectable activity against these organisms. These results demonstrated that MeOH extracts of M. dichotoma, without showing hemolytic side effects, could be further analysed for potential use against T. mentagrophytes and S. aureus infections.
