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Gold nanoparticle-DNA aptamer-assisted delivery of antimicrobial peptide effectively inhibits Acinetobacter baumannii infection in mice

  • Systems and Synthetic Microbiology and Bioinformatics
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Abstract

Acinetobacter baumannii causes multidrug resistance, leading to fatal infections in humans. In this study, we showed that Lys AB2 P3-His-a hexahistidine-tagged form of an antimicrobial peptide (AMP) loaded onto DNA aptamer-functionalized gold nanoparticles (AuNP-Apt)-can effectively inhibit A. baumannii infection in mice. When A. baumannii-infected mice were intraperitoneally injected with AuNP-Apt loaded with Lys AB2 P3-His, a marked reduction in A. baumannii colonization was observed in the mouse organs, leading to prominently increased survival time and rate of the mice compared to those of the control mice treated with AuNP-Apt or Lys AB2 P3-His only. This study shows that AMPs loaded onto AuNP-Apt could be an effective therapeutic tool against infections caused by multidrug-resistant pathogenic bacteria in humans.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Drs. Minkyung Ryu and Hanyong Jin for their technical assistance on this work. This research was supported by the Chung-Ang University Graduate Research Scholarship grants in 2020 and the National Research Foundation of Korea [NRF-2021R1A2C3008934 to K. L. and NRF-2021R1-I1A1A01056162 to J-H. Y].

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  1. These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Life Science, Chung-Ang University, Seoul, 06974, Republic of Korea

    Jaeyeong Park, Eunkyoung Shin, Ji-Hyun Yeom, Younkyung Choi, Minju Joo & Kangseok Lee

  2. Department of Microbiology, College of Medicine, Hallym University, Chuncheon, 24252, Republic of Korea

    Minho Lee

  3. Division of Pulmonology, Department of Internal Medicine, Korea University Ansan Hospital, Ansan, 15355, Republic of Korea

    Je Hyeong Kim

  4. School of Pharmacy, Chung-Ang University, Seoul, 06974, Republic of Korea

    Jeehyeon Bae

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  1. Jaeyeong Park
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Correspondence to Jeehyeon Bae or Kangseok Lee.

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All experimental procedures were reviewed and approved by the Chung-Ang University Support Center for Animal Experiments, and all research methods have been conducted in accordance with the guidelines and regulations. Animal handling guidelines were approved by the Chung-Ang University Institutional Animal Case and Use Committee (Approval #CAU2020-00115).

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Park, J., Shin, E., Yeom, JH. et al. Gold nanoparticle-DNA aptamer-assisted delivery of antimicrobial peptide effectively inhibits Acinetobacter baumannii infection in mice. J Microbiol. 60, 128–136 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12275-022-1620-3

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