Bacteria can regulate community-wide behaviors including biofilm formation, virulence, conjugation, sporulation, and swarming motility through a process called quorum sensing. Inhibitors and antagonists of bacterial quorum sensing are important research tools and potential therapeutic agents. In this review, we have summarized recent developments in this area.
A stable and highly selective fluorescent probe has been designed and synthesized for the rapid detection of fluoride ions (F−) in aqueous solution and living cells. The design was based on the high reactivity of F− toward a silyl group.
Quorum sensing has been implicated in the control of pathologically relevant bacterial behavior such as secretion of virulence factors, biofilm formation, sporulation, and swarming motility. The AI-2 quorum sensing pathway is found in both gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria. Therefore, antagonizing AI-2 quorum sensing is a possible approach to modifying bacterial behaviour. However, efforts in developing inhibitors of AI-2-mediated quorum sensing are especially lacking. High-throughput virtual screening using the V. harveyi LuxP crystal structure identified two compounds that were found to antagonize AI-2-mediated quorum sensing in V. harveyi without cytotoxicity. The sulfone functionality of these inhibitors was identified as critical to their ability to mimic the natural ligand in their interactions with Arg 215 and Arg 310 of the active site.
Bacterial quorum sensing has received much attention in recent years because of its relevance to pathological events such as biofilm formation. Based on the structures of two lead inhibitors (IC50: 35-55 microM) against autoinducer-2-mediated quorum sensing identified through virtual screening, we synthesized 39 analogues and examined their inhibitory activities. Twelve of these new analogues showed equal or better inhibitory activities than the lead inhibitors. The best compound showed an IC50 value of approximately 6 microM in a whole-cell assay using Vibrio harveyi as the model organism. The structure-activity relationship is discussed herein.
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