The Best Peptidomimetic Strategies to Undercover Antibacterial Peptides

Joanna Izabela Lachowicz, Kacper Szczepski, Alessandra Scano, Cinzia Casu, Sara Fais, Germano Orrù, Barbara Pisano, Monica Piras, Mariusz Jaremko

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

28 Scopus citations

Abstract

Health-care systems that develop rapidly and efficiently may increase the lifespan of humans. Nevertheless, the older population is more fragile, and is at an increased risk of disease development. A concurrently growing number of surgeries and transplantations have caused antibiotics to be used much more frequently, and for much longer periods of time, which in turn increases microbial resistance. In 1945, Fleming warned against the abuse of antibiotics in his Nobel lecture: “The time may come when penicillin can be bought by anyone in the shops. Then there is the danger that the ignorant man may easily underdose himself and by exposing his microbes to non-lethal quantities of the drug make them resistant”. After 70 years, we are witnessing the fulfilment of Fleming’s prophecy, as more than 700,000 people die each year due to drug-resistant diseases. Naturally occurring antimicrobial peptides protect all living matter against bacteria, and now different peptidomimetic strategies to engineer innovative antibiotics are being developed to defend humans against bacterial infections.
Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)7349
JournalInternational Journal of Molecular Sciences
Volume21
Issue number19
DOIs
StatePublished - Oct 5 2020

Bibliographical note

KAUST Repository Item: Exported on 2020-10-09
Acknowledgements: K.S. and M.J. would like to thank King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) for financial support.

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