Insect Cecropins, Antimicrobial Peptides with Potential Therapeutic Applications

Brady, Daniel; Grapputo, Alessandro; Romoli, Ottavia; Sandrelli, Federica

doi:10.3390/ijms20235862

Cited by 130 publications

(101 citation statements)

References 142 publications

(213 reference statements)

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“…31,32,34 In particular, cecropins (Cec) are a type of antimicrobial peptide with potential therapeutic applications. 38 They belong to a group of naturally occurring AMPs in insects and have exhibited in vitro activity against Grampositive and Gram-negative bacteria. 38 In this study, we investigated the in vitro antibacterial activity of a novel short synthetic CAMP derived from the ΔM2 analog of Cec D-like (CAMP-CecD) 27 against clinical strains of K pneumoniae and P aeruginosa.…”

Section: Evolutionary Bioinformaticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Novel Cecropin D-Derived Short Cationic Antimicrobial Peptide Exhibits Antibacterial Activity Against Wild-Type and Multidrug-Resistant Strains of Klebsiella pneumoniae and Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Ocampo-Ibáñez

Liscano

Sánchez

et al. 2020

Evol Bioinform Online

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Infections caused by multidrug-resistant (MDR) Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Klebsiella pneumoniae are a serious worldwide public health concern due to the ineffectiveness of empirical antibiotic therapy. Therefore, research and the development of new antibiotic alternatives are urgently needed to control these bacteria. The use of cationic antimicrobial peptides (CAMPs) is a promising candidate alternative therapeutic strategy to antibiotics because they exhibit antibacterial activity against both antibiotic susceptible and MDR strains. In this study, we aimed to investigate the in vitro antibacterial effect of a short synthetic CAMP derived from the ΔM2 analog of Cec D-like (CAMP-CecD) against clinical isolates of K pneumoniae (n = 30) and P aeruginosa (n = 30), as well as its hemolytic activity. Minimal inhibitory concentrations (MICs) and minimal bactericidal concentrations (MBCs) of CAMP-CecD against wild-type and MDR strains were determined by the broth microdilution test. In addition, an in silico molecular dynamic simulation was performed to predict the interaction between CAMP-CecD and membrane models of K pneumoniae and P aeruginosa. The results revealed a bactericidal effect of CAMP-CecD against both wild-type and resistant strains, but MDR P aeruginosa showed higher susceptibility to this peptide with MIC values between 32 and >256 μg/mL. CAMP-CecD showed higher stability in the P aeruginosa membrane model compared with the K pneumoniae model due to the greater number of noncovalent interactions with phospholipid 1-Palmitoyl-2-oleyl-sn-glycero-3-(phospho-rac-(1-glycerol)) (POPG). This may be related to the boosted effectiveness of the peptide against P aeruginosa clinical isolates. Given the antibacterial activity of CAMP-CecD against wild-type and MDR clinical isolates of P aeruginosa and K pneumoniae and its nonhemolytic effects on human erythrocytes, CAMP-CecD may be a promising alternative to conventional antibiotics.

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Section: Evolutionary Bioinformaticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Novel Cecropin D-Derived Short Cationic Antimicrobial Peptide Exhibits Antibacterial Activity Against Wild-Type and Multidrug-Resistant Strains of Klebsiella pneumoniae and Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Ocampo-Ibáñez

Liscano

Sánchez

et al. 2020

Evol Bioinform Online

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“…Cecropin was the first AMP isolated from insects and is derived from the hemolymph of the moth Hyalophora cecropia (Hancock and Sahl, 2006). Members of the cecropin family typically have peptide chains consisting of 31-39 amino acids and possess broad-spectrum antimicrobial activities (Brady et al, 2019). Several studies have shown that cecropin, when used as a feed additive, can increase the performance of livestock and poultry while also protecting them from lethal pathogen infections (Wen and He, 2012;Wu et al, 2012;Xiao et al, 2015;Shrestha et al, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Insight Into the Effects of Nisin and Cecropin on the Oral Microbial Community of Rats by High-Throughput Sequencing

Ran

et al. 2020

Front. Microbiol.

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The oral microbiome has major impacts on oral health and disease. Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs), such as nisin and cecropin, have been widely used as food preservatives or feed additives, and are thus inevitably ingested by consumers through their oral cavity. However, as broad-spectrum antimicrobial reagents, the effect of AMPs on the oral microbiome of consumer's remains poorly characterized. In this study, we performed 16S rDNA high-throughput sequencing to investigate the effect of nisin and cecropin on the oral microbiomes of rats. Our results suggest that although nisin and cecropin have different effects on the oral microbiome of rats, both AMPs impact the composition of oral microbial communities at the phylum and genus levels. Cecropin significantly reduced the diversity and richness of rat oral microbial communities. Notably, the relative abundance of the pathogen Acinetobacter baumannii increased in the oral microbial community of rats fed cecropin-containing feed. In addition, nisin significantly reduced the amount of secretory immunoglobulin A in the saliva of rats.

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“…In the recent years, AMPs gained attention as new drugs or alternate candidates over classical antibiotics to overcome the acquired multidrug resistance of microbes in clinical settings, because the targets of the AMPs are predominantly microbial membrane which allows reduced resistance compared to conventional antibiotics targeting intracellular components [ 2 , 3 ]. Several AMPs have been purified, identified, and studied from the largest class insect of arthropods in the past decades [ 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Transcriptome Analysis of Psacothea hilaris: De Novo Assembly and Antimicrobial Peptide Prediction

Lee

Chung

Shin

et al. 2020

Insects

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Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are the frontline innate defense system evolutionarily preserved in insects to combat invading pathogens. These AMPs could serve as an alternative to classical antibiotics to overcome the burden of treating multidrug resistant bacteria. Psacotheasin, a knottin type AMP was isolated from Psacothea hilaris and shown to exhibit antimicrobial activity, especially against fungi through apoptosis mediated cell death. In this study, we aimed to identify novel probable AMPs from Psacothea hilaris, the yellow spotted longicorn beetle. The beetle was immunized with the two bacterial strains (E. coli and S. aureus), and the yeast strain C. albicans. After immunization, total RNA was isolated and sequenced in Illumina platform. Then, beetle transcriptome was de novo assembled and searched for putative AMPs with the known physiochemical features of the AMPs. A selection of AMP candidates were synthesized and tested for antimicrobial activity. Four peptides showed stronger activity against E. coli than the control AMP, melittin while one peptide showed similar activity against S. aureus. Moreover, four peptides and two peptides showed antifungal activity stronger than and similar to melittin, respectively. Collectively one peptide showed both antibacterial and antifungal activity superior to melittin; thus, it provides a potent antimicrobial peptide. All the peptides showed no hemolysis in all the tested concentrations. These results suggest that in silico mining of insects’ transcriptome could be a promising tool to obtain and optimize novel AMPs for human needs.

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Insect Cecropins, Antimicrobial Peptides with Potential Therapeutic Applications

Cited by 130 publications

References 142 publications

A Novel Cecropin D-Derived Short Cationic Antimicrobial Peptide Exhibits Antibacterial Activity Against Wild-Type and Multidrug-Resistant Strains of Klebsiella pneumoniae and Pseudomonas aeruginosa

A Novel Cecropin D-Derived Short Cationic Antimicrobial Peptide Exhibits Antibacterial Activity Against Wild-Type and Multidrug-Resistant Strains of Klebsiella pneumoniae and Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Insight Into the Effects of Nisin and Cecropin on the Oral Microbial Community of Rats by High-Throughput Sequencing

Transcriptome Analysis of Psacothea hilaris: De Novo Assembly and Antimicrobial Peptide Prediction

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