Antimicrobial peptides and proteins are key components of the human innate immune response, serving to inhibit microbial colonization. Transition metal ions are essential nutrients for prokaryotes, and metal-chelating host-defense proteins are important players in the innate immune response. Many of these proteins function as high-affinity metal-ion chelators in the extracellular milieu to deprive invading microbes of metal ions that are required for metabolism replication (e.g., manganese, iron, zinc). We evaluate metal-chelating host-defense proteins such as human calprotectin from the standpoints of coordination chemistry and biology with the long-term goals of elucidating how these proteins contribute to human and microbial physiology at the molecular level. Here we present a case study that exemplifies how the human host prevents microbial acquisition of manganese and zinc. This research was supported by the Kinship Foundation (Searle Scholars Program), the MIT Center for Environmental Health Sciences (NIH Grant P30-ES002109), and the MIT Department of Chemistry.

Bioinorganic explorations of human host-defense proteins

247th National Meeting (2014)

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