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Novel alternatives to antibiotics: bacteriophages, bacterial cell wall hydrolases, and antimicrobial peptides
Author(s) -
Parisien A.,
Allain B.,
Zhang J.,
Mandeville R.,
Lan C.Q.
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
journal of applied microbiology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.889
H-Index - 156
eISSN - 1365-2672
pISSN - 1364-5072
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2672.2007.03498.x
Subject(s) - lysogenic cycle , prophage , biology , microbiology and biotechnology , lysin , antimicrobial peptides , lytic cycle , bacteriophage , antibiotics , antimicrobial , phage therapy , bacterial cell structure , bacteria , virulence , computational biology , virology , gene , genetics , escherichia coli , virus
Summary Extensive research has been conducted on the development of three groups of naturally occurring antimicrobials as novel alternatives to antibiotics: bacteriophages (phages), bacterial cell wall hydrolases (BCWH), and antimicrobial peptides (AMP). Phage therapies are highly efficient, highly specific, and relatively cost‐effective. However, precautions have to be taken in the selection of phage candidates for therapeutic applications as some phages may encode toxins and others may, when integrated into host bacterial genome and converted to prophages in a lysogenic cycle, lead to bacterial immunity and altered virulence. BCWH are divided into three groups: lysozymes, autolysins, and virolysins. Among them, virolysins are the most promising candidates as they are highly specific and have the capability to rapidly lyse antibiotic‐resistant bacteria on a generally species‐specific basis. Finally, AMP are a family of natural proteins produced by eukaryotic and prokaryotic organisms or encoded by phages. AMP are of vast diversity in term of size, structure, mode of action, and specificity and have a high potential for clinical therapeutic applications.