Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 15, 2026

Antibiotic Dereplication Using the Antibiotic Resistance Platform
Published on: October 17, 2019
Discovery and syntheses of "superbug challengers"-platensimycin and platencin
Kalanidhi Palanichamy1, Krishna P Kaliappan
1Department of Chemistry, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Powai, Mumbai-400 076, India.
Abstract:
Bacteria have developed resistance to almost all existing antibiotics known today and this has been a major issue over the last few decades. The search for a new class of antibiotics with a new mode of action to fight these multiply-drug-resistant strains, or "superbugs", allowed a team of scientists at Merck to discover two novel antibiotics, platensimycin and platencin using advanced screening strategies, as inhibitors of bacterial fatty acid biosynthesis, which is essential for the survival of bacteria. Though both these antibiotics are structurally related, they work by slightly different mechanisms and target different enzymes conserved in the bacterial fatty acid biosynthesis. This Focus Review summarizes the synthetic and biological aspects of these natural products and their analogues and congeners.
More Related Videos
Related Concept Videos
Antibiotic Selection
Production of Antibiotics
Plasmids
Inhibitors of Bacterial Protein Synthesis
Clinical Significance of Antibiotic Resistance
Inhibitors of Gram-positive Cell Wall Synthesis

