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BF-30 effectively inhibits ciprofloxacin-resistant bacteria in vitro and in a rat model of vaginosis

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Abstract

Bacterial infections are becoming increasingly difficult to treat due to the increasing number of multidrug-resistant strains. Cathelicidin-BF (BF-30) is a cathelicidin-like antimicrobial peptide and exhibits broad antimicrobial activity against bacteria. In the present study, the antibacterial activity of BF-30 against ciprofloxacin-resistant Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus was examined, and the protective effects of this peptide against these bacteria in rats with bacterial vaginosis were identified for the first time. The data showed that BF-30 had effective antimicrobial activities against ciprofloxacin-resistant E. coli and S. aureus. The minimal inhibitory concentrations for both bacterial strains were 16 μg/ml, and the minimal bactericidal concentrations were 64 and 128 μg/ml, respectively. A time course experiment showed that the CFU counts rapidly decreased after BF-30 treatment, and the bacteria were nearly eliminated within 4 h. BF-30 could reduce the fold change (CFU/ml) in local colonization by drug-resistant E. coli and S. aureus to 0.01 at a dose of 0.8 mg/kg/day in the rats’ vaginal secretions. In addition, BF-30 induced membrane permeabilization and bound to the genomic DNA, interrupting protein synthesis. Taken together, our data demonstrate that BF-30 has potential therapeutic value for the prevention and treatment of bacterial vaginosis.

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Acknowledgments

This study was sponsored by the Scientific and Technological Support and Social Development Plan of Jiangsu Province (BE2012743), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (JKP2011018), and the ‘111 Project’ from the Ministry of Education of China and the State Administration of Foreign Expert Affairs of China (111-2-07).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Natural Medicines, School of Life Science and Technology, China Pharmaceutical University, 24 Tong Jia Xiang, Nanjing, 210009, People’s Republic of China

    Jing Wang, Bing Li, Yang Li, Jie Dou, Qingru Hao, Yuwei Tian, Hui Wang & Changlin Zhou

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  1. Jing Wang
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  2. Bing Li
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  3. Yang Li
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Correspondence to Changlin Zhou.

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Jing Wang and Bing Li have contributed equally to this work.

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Wang, J., Li, B., Li, Y. et al. BF-30 effectively inhibits ciprofloxacin-resistant bacteria in vitro and in a rat model of vaginosis. Arch. Pharm. Res. 37, 927–936 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12272-013-0248-6

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