Global public health is increasingly threatened by the fast emergence of antibiotic resistance, and novel types of antibiotics are urgently needed. Metazoans have evolved their own antimicrobial mechanism, such as human group IIA secreted phospholipase A (sPLA2), which can efficiently inhibit the growth of gram-positive bacteria, but with much lower efficiency toward gram-negative bacteria. Here, we verified the antibacterial activity of a plant lipase, PLIP1 from Arabidopsis thaliana, against the gram-negative bacteria Escherichia coli, which belongs to the WHO priority 1 (critical) pathogen Enterobacteriaceae family. We also explored the potential of evolving PLIP1 as a more potent antimicrobial agent towards E. coli. Our results imply the possibility of using plant lipases as a potential antimicrobial and shed light on the future exploration of plant enzymes for novel and more efficient antibacterial agents.

中文翻译：

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探索植物磷脂酶作为抗菌剂的潜力

抗生素耐药性的迅速出现正日益威胁着全球公共卫生，因此迫切需要新型的抗生素。后生动物已经进化出自己的抗菌机制，例如人类IIA类分泌的磷脂酶A（sPLA2），它可以有效地抑制革兰氏阳性细菌的生长，但对革兰氏阴性细菌的效率要低得多。在这里，我们验证了一种植物脂肪酶，来自拟南芥的PLIP1对革兰氏阴性细菌大肠杆菌的抗菌活性，该细菌属于WHO优先级1（关键）病原菌肠杆菌科。我们还探索了将PLIP1进化为对大肠杆菌更有效的抗菌剂的潜力。