Berberine Damages the Cell Surface of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus

Abstract

Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is currently regarded as one of the most important drug-resistant pathogens causing nosocomial and communityacquired infections. Although berberine (BER) has shown anti-MRSA activity, the underlying mechanism is still unclear. In this study, the damage caused by BER on the cell surface of MRSA was systematically investigated by performing BER susceptibility test, determining K + and alkaline phosphatase (ALP) release, detecting morphological alterations using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM), and ascertaining lipid profiles. The results showed that the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of BER against MRSA252 was 128 µg/ml. Under the sub-MIC doses of BER, cell membrane permeability gradually increased in a dose-dependent manner, and 1 × MIC led to 43.8% higher K + leakage and fourfold higher ALP secretion. The injuries on MRSA cell surface were further verified by SEM and TEM, and some cells displayed a doughnut-shaped structure. BER significantly altered the fatty acid species contents, including saturated fatty acids (C 14:0 , C 15:0 , C 16:0 , C 18:0 , and C 20:0 ), and unsaturated fatty acids (C 20:4 , C 20:1 , and C 18:1 ), indicating that BER compromised cell membrane integrity via lipid fluctuation. Thus, the findings of this study could help to unravel the molecular mechanism of BER against MRSA.

In vitro Antimicrobial Activity and the Mechanism of Berberine Against Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Isolated from Bloodstream Infection Patients

“…Zhang et al found that BER could damage the cell surface of MRSA. 43 Therefore, it is reasonable to speculate that the substances may include the contents of punched bacterial cells due to BER treatment. This observation is consistent with the above findings, illustrating that BER can destroy MRSA cell walls in a concentration-dependent manner.…”

Review on the Antibacterial Mechanism of Plant-Derived Compounds against Multidrug-Resistant Bacteria (MDR)

“…Solasodine (3) and Tomatidine (4) are essential glycoalkaloid metabolites isolated from the Solanaceae genus [ 121 ]. These molecules are well-known for decades for their biological activity and as starting compounds for synthesizing steroid drugs [ 122 ]. According to a recent study, genomic analysis was performed to identify the cause of resistance in MRSA .…”

A New Perspective on the Antimicrobial Mechanism of Berberine Hydrochloride Against Staphylococcus aureus Revealed by Untargeted Metabolomic Studies

“…According to the existing research, the antibacterial effect of berberine can be generally summarized as “multi-effect” (Karaosmanoglu et al, 2014 ). Berberine can inhibit the formation of biofilm (Zhang et al, 2020 ; Bhatia et al, 2021 ; Xu et al, 2021 ), destroy the cell wall and cell membrane (Karaosmanoglu et al, 2014 ; Zhang et al, 2020 ; Xia et al, 2022 ), inhibit bacterial cell division (Domadia et al, 2008 ), inhibit nucleic acid and protein synthesis (Du et al, 2020 ), and inhibit bacterial adhesion (Kang et al, 2015 ), etc.…”

“…Some experimental evidence shows that berberine alone or in combination with other agents showed obvious antimicrobial effects in vivo and in vitro (Aksoy et al, 2020 ; Huang et al, 2020 ; Xie et al, 2020 ; Bhatia et al, 2021 ). Berberine even has the potential to inhibit antibiotic-resistant bacteria (Morita et al, 2016 ; Zhang et al, 2020 ; Li et al, 2021 ), which gives it great potential in the development of new antibiotics. There are many studies on the antimicrobial activity of berberine, and it is found that berberine has a variety of antimicrobial effects.…”