Department of Operative Dentistry and Endodontics, School of Stomatology, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi'an 710032, People's Republic of China.
Peptides. 2011 Aug;32(8):1748-54. doi: 10.1016/j.peptides.2011.06.008. Epub 2011 Jun 15.
Dental caries is a common oral bacterial infectious disease of global concern. Prevention and treatment of caries requires control of the dental plaque formed by pathogens such as Streptococcus mutans and Streptococcus sobrinus. Pleurocidin, produced by Pleuronectes americanus, is an antimicrobial peptide that exerts broad-spectrum activity against pathogenic bacteria and fungi. Moreover, pleurocidin shows less hemolysis and is less toxic than other natural peptides. In the present study, we investigated whether pleurocidin is an effective antibiotic peptide against common cariogenic microorganisms and performed a preliminary study of the antimicrobial mechanism. We assayed minimal inhibitory concentration (MIC), minimal bactericide concentration (MBC) and bactericidal kinetics and performed a spot-on-lawn assay. The BioFlux system was used to generate bacterial biofilms under controllable flow. Fluorescence microscopy and confocal laser scanning microscopy (CLSM) were used to analyze and observe biofilms. Scanning electron microscopy was used to observe the bacterial membrane. MIC and MBC results showed that pleurocidin had different antimicrobial activities against the tested oral strains. Although components of saliva could affect antimicrobial activity, pleurocidin dissolved in saliva still showed antimicrobial effects against oral microorganisms. Furthermore, pleurocidin showed a favorable killing effect against BioFlux flow biofilms in vitro. Our findings suggest that pleurocidin has the potential to kill dental biofilms and prevent dental caries.
龋齿是一种常见的口腔细菌性传染病，受到全球关注。预防和治疗龋齿需要控制变形链球菌和远缘链球菌等病原体形成的牙菌斑。鲽鱼抗菌肽是由美洲大比目鱼产生的一种抗菌肽，对致病菌和真菌具有广谱活性。此外，鲽鱼抗菌肽的溶血率比其他天然肽低，毒性也较小。本研究探讨了鲽鱼抗菌肽是否对常见致龋微生物有效，并对其抗菌机制进行了初步研究。我们测定了最小抑菌浓度（MIC）、最小杀菌浓度（MBC）和杀菌动力学，并进行了点样法平板试验。BioFlux 系统用于在可控流量下生成细菌生物膜。荧光显微镜和共聚焦激光扫描显微镜（CLSM）用于分析和观察生物膜。扫描电子显微镜用于观察细菌膜。MIC 和 MBC 结果表明，鲽鱼抗菌肽对测试的口腔菌株具有不同的抗菌活性。尽管唾液中的成分可能会影响抗菌活性，但溶解在唾液中的鲽鱼抗菌肽仍对口腔微生物具有抗菌作用。此外，鲽鱼抗菌肽对体外 BioFlux 流动生物膜表现出良好的杀伤效果。我们的研究结果表明，鲽鱼抗菌肽具有杀死牙菌斑和预防龋齿的潜力。
