Isolation of an antioxidant from Penicillium roquefortii IFO 5956

In the search for antioxidants from microbial organisms, we found that Penicillium roquefortii IFO 5956 produced an antioxidant. This antioxidant was isolated from a culture broth of the strain, and its structure was identified to be 2,3-dihydroxy benzoic acid (1). The antioxidative activity of 1 was nearly equal to that of tert-butyl-4-hydroxyanisol (BHA).