WHAT do you get if you cross a frog with a non-stick frying pan? Possibly a new generation of antibiotics.
For years, researchers have tried to make antibiotics from antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) 鈥� proteins found in almost all animals, but particularly in the skin of the African clawed frog, Xenopus laevis. AMPs provide the first line of defence against invading bacteria, but when injected into the body, they are quickly degraded by enzymes called proteases. If the concentration of AMPs is increased to overcome this they become toxic, sticking to red blood cells and killing them.
Now Neil Marsh and his colleagues at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, have discovered that adding fluorine atoms 鈥� the key component of the non-stick coating Teflon 鈥� to AMPs protects them from proteases.
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By swapping some of the amino acids in the peptide for ones containing fluorine, they created an AMP that remained intact after exposure to proteases for 10 hours. AMPs without fluorine were completely degraded after 30 minutes.
Fluorine also made the AMPs more potent against certain bacteria, including MRSA. The findings were presented at the meeting in Boston this week.
The researchers are now investigating whether fluorinated AMPs are less likely to stick to and destroy red blood cells. 鈥淲e鈥檙e hoping they鈥檒l be intrinsically less toxic,鈥� says Marsh.
