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Multifunctional host defense peptides: antiparasitic activities
Author(s) -
Mor Amram
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
the febs journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.981
H-Index - 204
eISSN - 1742-4658
pISSN - 1742-464X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1742-4658.2009.07358.x
Subject(s) - antiparasitic , antiparasitic agent , biology , leishmania , antimicrobial , drug development , drug , computational biology , microbiology and biotechnology , pharmacology , medicine , parasite hosting , pathology , world wide web , computer science
Whereas significant knowledge is accumulating on the antibacterial and antifungal properties of host defense peptides (HDPs) and their synthetic mimics, much less is known of their activities against parasites. A variety of in vitro and in vivo antiparasitic assays suggest that these notorious antimicrobial compounds could represent a powerful tool for the development of novel drugs to fight parasites in the vertebrate host or to complement current therapeutic strategies, albeit the fact that HDPs essentially act by nonspecific mechanisms casts serious doubt on their ability to exert sufficient selectivity to be considered ideal candidates for drug development. This minireview summarizes recent efforts to assess the antiparasitic properties of HDPs and their synthetic derivatives, focusing on two of the most used models – Plasmodium and Leishmania species – for antiparasitic assays against the different development stages.