Testing Antimicrobial Properties of Selected Short Amyloids

Area of Science:

• Biochemistry
• Molecular Biology
• Immunology

Background:

• Amyloids and antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) share similarities in membrane disruption, aggregation, and immune modulation.
• The antimicrobial potential of short amyloids remains largely unexplored.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the antimicrobial and cytotoxic properties of selected short amyloids.
• To evaluate the potential of these amyloids as antimicrobial agents.
• To assess their utility in training next-generation AMP prediction models.

Main Methods:

• Utilized AmpGram, a leading AMP classification model, to identify ten short amyloids with high AMP probability.
• Experimentally tested the selected amyloids for antimicrobial activity against bacterial and eukaryotic cells.
• Assessed the aggregation behavior of amyloids under standard peptide evaluation conditions.

Main Results:

• Four tested amyloids (VQIVCK, VCIVYK, KCWCFT, GGYLLG) formed aggregates under experimental conditions.
• None of the investigated amyloids demonstrated significant antimicrobial or cytotoxic effects.
• The study identified specific amyloid sequences that can serve as negative controls.

Conclusions:

• Short amyloids, despite structural similarities to AMPs, do not inherently possess antimicrobial or cytotoxic properties.
• Experimentally validated non-antimicrobial peptide (non-AMP) sequences are crucial for developing accurate predictive models.
• The findings underscore the importance of reporting confirmed non-AMPs to improve AMP discovery pipelines.