Bioprospecting potential and textile dyeing of Mycobial red pigment from novel microorganism Nigrospora oryzae

Natural pigments are getting prominence because of the hazardous effects from the use of synthetic colouring chemicals. Microbial pigments, in addition to their vast biological activities, provide an easily accessible alternative supply of natural colours. A total of twenty-four fungal cultures were isolated from the leaf tissues of Senna auriculata , out of which a distinctive strain (FNG1) exhibited an extracellular pigmentation of reddish orange. The isolate was identified as Nigrospora oryzae based on morphological traits and a molecular phylogenetic study of a combined Internal Transcribed Spacer (ITS) and β- tubulin analysis. The crude red pigment was the most soluble in ethyl acetate. The natural pigment was characterised and partly purified using thin-layer chromatography. As a result, the partly purified fungal pigment Ergo , was used in further bioprospecting investigations. The antimicrobial activity of the partly purified sample was evaluated against eight human pathogens, with the maximum zone of inhibition identified in Leucobacter AA7 (200–500 µg/mL). DPPH scavenging activity of the compound increased from 38.2–67.9% with an IC 50 value of 34.195 ± 2.33 µg/mL. The cytotoxicity of partially purified fungal pigment inhibited cancer cells while having little effect on non-cancerous HEK293 T cells. The gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS) provided evidence that the compound produced had antibacterial and anticancer properties. Cotton fabrics have the highest staining capacity for crude mycobial pigment, which is fast and exhibited negative cytotoxicity. This is the first report from novel microorganism N. oryzae .