Herbacic acid, a simple prototype of 5,5,5-trichloroleucine metabolites from the sponge Dysidea herbacea.

Dysidea herbacea, collected at Harrier Reef on the Great Barrier Reef, contains the novel metabolite herbacic acid as the major trichloroleucine metabolite. Herbacic acid appears to be an early product of direct free-radical chlorination of leucine and is a prototype for further transformation of the free carboxylic acid group and generation of complex trichloromethyl metabolites, including natural products of the dysidenin family.