The Bacteriocin Sublancin Attenuates Intestinal Injury in Young Mice Infected With Staphylococcus aureus

Abstract

Sublancin, a bacteriocin, has bactericidal activity against a broad spectrum of gram-positive bacteria. However, studies have not been conducted to determine its in vivo efficacy against potential pathogens. The objective of this study was to investigate the effects of sublancin in a Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) infected mouse model which induced intestinal injury. A total of 160, 4-week-old mice were randomly assigned to one of eight treatments. Mice in the control group were injected intraperitoneally with 0.5 mL of 0.9% saline. Mice in the other seven groups were given an intraperitoneal injection of 0.5 mL saline containing 1.0 3 10 10 colony-forming units (CFU)/mL S. aureus. Six hours after inoculation, mice in the control group were again injected with 0.5 mL of 0.9% saline. Mice in the other seven groups were injected intraperitoneally with 0.5 mL of 0.9% saline containing 0, 0.5, 1.0, 2.0, or 4.0 mg/kg body weight (BW) sublancin or 1.0 or 2.0 mg/kg BW ampicillin. The results showed that 4.0 mg/kg sublancin and 2.0 mg/kg ampicillin significantly reduced mice mortality from 55 to 10%. The height and the number of proliferated cells from the intestinal villi in the sublancin and ampicillin treated mice were higher than in the control. We conclude that sublancin has potent antibacterial activity against S. aureus. Therefore, sublancin could find use as an alternative antimicrobial agent for the treatment of gram-positive bacterial infections.

Bacteriocins and their position in the next wave of conventional antibiotics

“…Nisin is known to effectively inhibit numerous Gram-positive bacteria, leading to its usage in the food industry [40][41][42]. Similarly, nukacin ISK-1, produced by Staphylococcus warneri, inhibits cell wall synthesis by binding lipid II but it has not been shown to induce pore formation [43][44][45].…”

The Phosphoenolpyruvate:Sugar Phosphotransferase System Is Involved in Sensitivity to the Glucosylated Bacteriocin Sublancin

“…It is capable of killing several species of Gram-positive bacteria, such as Staphylococcus aureus, including methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA) (12). Sublancin is encoded by the sunA gene on the SP␤ prophage as a prepeptide (13).…”

Enhancement of Macrophage Function by the Antimicrobial Peptide Sublancin Protects Mice from Methicillin-ResistantStaphylococcus aureus

“…Although the minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of sublancin was much higher than that of traditional antibiotics in vitro , it was demonstrated that sublancin was effective against Clostridium perfringens induced necrotic enteritis in broilers (16). We also found that sublancin has potential for prevention of S. aureus infection in mice (17). Moreover, sublancin was further found to protect against drug-resistant bacteria in a mouse MRSA infection model (18).…”

“…Sublancin, produced by Bacillus subtilis 168, has been studied extensively for its antibacterial mechanisms (30, 31). Following our previous studies of the anti-infective efficacy of sublancin in several in vivo infection models (16, 17), we examined its role and anti-infection mechanism in a mouse model of MRSA-induced sublethal infection.…”

“…These cells were incubated for 2 h, and adherent cells were used as peritoneal macrophages. Sublancin was generated in our laboratory using a highly efficient expression system involving Bacillus subtilis 800 as described privously (17). The purity of this peptide was above 99.6% as determined by high-performance liquid chromatography.…”