Abstract
Escherichia coli is an important zoonotic pathogen causing intestinal diseases. In recent years, due to the unreasonable use of antibiotics, the drug resistance of bacteria has been increasing, and the proportion of multi-drug resistant strains has also been rising, which directly threatens the health of animals and humans. The antimicrobial peptide MPX was isolated from wasp venom and had better antibacterial activity against Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Studies have found that MPX had better bactericidal activity against E. coli in vitro. However, whether MPX also has better bactericidal activity in mice is still unknown. This study found that E. coli infected mice lost appetite, diarrhea, and grouping together, while MPX treatment significantly alleviated these symptoms. The autopsy results found that the intestinal congestion, bleeding, thinning of the intestinal wall, yellow viscous fluid in the intestinal cavity, congestion of the lungs, necrosis in the liver, congestion, and bleeding of the spleen, and MPX treatment effectively relieved the above symptoms. The qRT-PCR results found that MPX could increase the mRNA expression of the antibacterial protein TFF3 in the jejunum and colon and reduce the expression of the antibacterial protein Remlβ and REG3γ in the jejunum and colon. H&E staining results further found that MPX could alleviate the pathological damage of mouse intestines and organs caused by E. coli infection. The above results show that MPX has good bactericidal activity against E. coli infection in mice, providing an essential reference for screening drugs for the clinical treatment of E. coli infection.
Highlights
Escherichia coli is a gram-negative bacterium and common zoonotic pathogen, which causes many human epidemics
Mice infected with E. coli had intestinal congestion, hemorrhage, intestinal wall thinning, and easy to rupture, the intestinal cavity was filled with a yellow viscous liquid, the jejunum was severely congested, and the lungs, liver, and spleen were congested and bleeding
While MPX could effectively alleviate the intestinal inflammatory response and organ pathological damage caused by E. coli infection, its effect was equivalent to that of the antibiotic Enro
Summary
Escherichia coli is a gram-negative bacterium and common zoonotic pathogen, which causes many human epidemics. In the United States, more than 100,000 people are infected with EHEC 0157:H7 every year (Malavolta et al, 2019). Studies have reported that EHEC infection in pig intestinal tract contents and feces in central China is high (Bae et al, 2021). The harm of E. coli is manifested in causing animal diseases and bringing substantial economic losses to the breeding industry and animal husbandry, and a reservoir of drug resistance genes for other pathogenic bacteria, and the drug resistance genes carried by the food chain passed to Humans (Liang et al, 2021). There is an urgent need to find new antibacterial drugs against E. coli infection, and not easy to develop drug resistance
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