The effects of synthetic Azurocidin peptide analogue on Staphylococcus aureus bacterium

Antibiotics are commonly used as anti-infection drugs. However, the rising of microbial resistance to antibiotics imposes a major challenge to their widespread applications. Hence, there is a growing need to find alternative drugs to eradicate the microbial resistance arising from the excessive use of antibiotics. Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) are natural defence molecules found in human body. These AMP are present virtually in all life forms where they act as the first line defence agents against invading pathogens. Published studies ^{[1] [2]} suggest the possible use of AMPs as alternative anti-infective drugs. In this study we evaluated the anti-microbial activity of a synthetic Azurocidin peptide analogue and compared its efficacy with the native natural antimicrobial peptide Azurocidin. The Resonant Recognition Model (RRM) was employed here to computationally design a short Azurocidin peptide analogue, Azu-RRM. According to the RRM, this de novo designed peptide analogue will mimic and exhibit the activity of the natural Azurocidin (Azu) protein. Within this study the antimicrobial activity of Azu-RRM was investigated on Staphylococcus aureus (ATCC 25923) bacterium. The results obtained reveal that the synthetic peptide analogue affected the growth of this gram positive bacterium. The findings also showed that the Azu-RRM is exhibiting the anti-microbial effects on the growth of the studied bacteria comparable with the suppressing effects induced by the natural Azu protein.