Antimicrobial Peptides with High Proteolytic Resistance for Combating Gram-Negative Bacteria

J Med Chem. 2019 Mar 14;62(5):2286-2304. doi: 10.1021/acs.jmedchem.8b01348. Epub 2019 Feb 22.

Abstract

Poor proteolytic resistance is an urgent problem to be solved in the clinical application of antimicrobial peptides (AMPs), yet common solutions, such as complicated chemical modifications and utilization of d-amino acids, greatly increase the difficulty and cost of producing AMPs. In this work, a set of novel peptides was synthesized based on an antitrypsin/antichymotrypsin hydrolytic peptide structure unit (XYPX) n (X represents I, L, and V; Y represents R and K), which was designed using a systematic natural amino acid arrangement. Of these peptides, 16 with seven repeat units had the highest average selectivity index (GMSI = 99.07) for all of the Gram-negative bacteria tested and remained highly effective in combating Escherichia coli infection in vivo. Importantly, 16 also had dramatic resistance to a high concentration of trypsin/chymotrypsin hydrolysis and exerted bactericidal activity through a membrane-disruptive mechanism. Overall, these findings provide new approaches for the development of antiprotease hydrolytic peptides that target Gram-negative bacteria.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Anti-Bacterial Agents / pharmacology*
  • Antimicrobial Cationic Peptides / chemistry
  • Antimicrobial Cationic Peptides / pharmacology*
  • Biocompatible Materials
  • Gram-Negative Bacteria / drug effects*
  • Gram-Negative Bacteria / ultrastructure
  • HEK293 Cells
  • Humans
  • Mice
  • Microbial Sensitivity Tests
  • Microscopy, Electron, Scanning
  • Proteolysis
  • RAW 264.7 Cells
  • Spectrometry, Fluorescence

Substances

  • Anti-Bacterial Agents
  • Antimicrobial Cationic Peptides
  • Biocompatible Materials