Integrated evolutionary analysis reveals antimicrobial peptides with limited resistance

Réka Spohn, Lejla Daruka, Viktória Lázár, Ana Martins, Fanni Vidovics, Gábor Grézal, Orsolya Méhi, Bálint Kintses, Mónika Számel, Pramod K. Jangir, Bálint Csörgő, Ádám Györkei, Zoltán Bódi, Anikó Faragó, László Bodai, Imre Földesi, Diána Kata, Gergely Maróti, Bernadett Pap, Roland Wirth, Balázs Papp and Csaba Pál ()
Additional contact information
Réka Spohn: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Lejla Daruka: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Viktória Lázár: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Ana Martins: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Fanni Vidovics: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Gábor Grézal: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Orsolya Méhi: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Bálint Kintses: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Mónika Számel: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Pramod K. Jangir: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Bálint Csörgő: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Ádám Györkei: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Zoltán Bódi: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Anikó Faragó: University of Szeged
László Bodai: University of Szeged
Imre Földesi: University of Szeged
Diána Kata: University of Szeged
Gergely Maróti: Hungarian Academy of Sciences
Bernadett Pap: Hungarian Academy of Sciences
Roland Wirth: University of Szeged
Balázs Papp: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre
Csaba Pál: Institute of Biochemistry, Biological Research Centre

Nature Communications, 2019, vol. 10, issue 1, 1-13

Abstract: Abstract Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are promising antimicrobials, however, the potential of bacterial resistance is a major concern. Here we systematically study the evolution of resistance to 14 chemically diverse AMPs and 12 antibiotics in Escherichia coli. Our work indicates that evolution of resistance against certain AMPs, such as tachyplesin II and cecropin P1, is limited. Resistance level provided by point mutations and gene amplification is very low and antibiotic-resistant bacteria display no cross-resistance to these AMPs. Moreover, genomic fragments derived from a wide range of soil bacteria confer no detectable resistance against these AMPs when introduced into native host bacteria on plasmids. We have found that simple physicochemical features dictate bacterial propensity to evolve resistance against AMPs. Our work could serve as a promising source for the development of new AMP-based therapeutics less prone to resistance, a feature necessary to avoid any possible interference with our innate immune system.

Date: 2019
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-12364-6 Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:10:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-019-12364-6

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-019-12364-6

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().