title: Lights, Camera, Action! Antimicrobial Peptide Mechanisms Imaged in Space and Time.
abstract: Deeper understanding of the bacteriostatic and bactericidal mechanisms of antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) should help in the design of new antibacterial agents. Over several decades, a variety of biochemical assays have been applied to bulk bacterial cultures. While some of these bulk assays provide time resolution of the order of 1min, they do not capture faster mechanistic events. Nor can they provide subcellular spatial information or discern cell-to-cell heterogeneity within the bacterial population. Single-cell, time-resolved imaging assays bring a completely new spatiotemporal dimension to AMP mechanistic studies. We review recent work that provides new insights into the timing, sequence, and spatial distribution of AMP-induced effects on bacterial cells.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI 53706, USA.
authors.forename: Heejun
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Choi
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI 53706, USA.
authors.forename: Nambirajan
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Rangarajan
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI 53706, USA. Electronic address: weisshaar@chem.wisc.edu.
authors.forename: James C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Weisshaar
mesh_terms: D023181:Antimicrobial Cationic Peptides / Q000494:pharmacology*; D001419:Bacteria / Q000166:cytology* / Q000187:drug effects* / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D002462:Cell Membrane / Q000187:drug effects / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D008856:Microscopy, Fluorescence
chemical_list: D023181:Antimicrobial Cationic Peptides
keywords: antimicrobial peptide mechanisms; membrane permeabilization; oxidative stress.; single-cell fluorescence microscopy