Abstract
Abstract Background Sponges are champion of bioactive producers because of the variety of products that have been found from them. Most bioactive compounds extracted from sponges were classified into antibiotic, antiviral, antitumor, and anti-inflammatory. Tow marine sponge species were collected during winter 2016 from Gulf of Aqaba, Red Sea, Egypt viz., Callyspongia crassa and Callyspongia siphonella. The collected sponge species belong to family Callyspongiidae. The sponge samples were extracted by ethanol and investigated as a promising source of natural products which can be used as antitumor, antiviral, and antimicrobial, antioxidant, and anti-inflammatory agents. Results Results revealed that the crude extract of C. siphonella showed high antitumor activity with value of 5.57 and 1.39 μg/ml as IC50 against colon cancer (caco-2) and breast cancer (Mcf-7) on cell line, respectively. Also the C. crassa extract showed high cytotoxic effect to Vero cell with HAV (hepatitis A virus), which exhibits that MIC was 9.765 μg/ml, the most effective extract was of C. crassa against Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Candida albicans. Also, ethanolic crude of C. siphonella showed positive antibacterial activity against P. aueroginosa. Indeed, there much other extracts exhibited no antibacterial activities, especially all extracts against Staphylococcus aureus and Vibrio damsela. The C. crassa extract conducted an antioxidant activity in corresponding to ascorbic acid standard with value of 671 μg/ml as IC50. There was only one crude extract that had anti-inflammatory activity; it was of C. crassa (61.47%). Conclusions The present investigation confirmed that the crude extract of C. siphonella conducted to promising antitumor agent against colon and breast cancer, while the crude extract of C. crassa conducted to promising anti-inflammatory and antiviral agents. In summary, the marine sponges are an indispensable, chemodiverse, biodiverse, and rich source of natural products and secondary metabolites with potent pharmacological effects. The studies should be interested with sponge-derived bioactive compounds as a promising strategy that deserves further attention in future investigations in order to address the limitations regarding sustainable supply of marine drugs.