With the continued overuse of antibiotics and the persistent mutation and resistance of microbes, a new source of antimicrobial agents have become a necessity in today’s overpopulating world. A possible, new class of antimicrobial agent is being developed within the Joy research group. Within our lab, polyurethanes are being synthesized to mimic the innate immune response found in all forms of life known as host defense peptides (HPDs). These broad spectrum peptides have been shown to obtain an affinity as natural antibacterial agents which have the ability to kill both gram-positive and gram-negative bacteria, as well as, envelope viruses, fungi and parasites. Due to tryptophan’s interesting properties and important role as an innate defense mechanism, the focus of the research is to create a mLys/mTrp copolymer that mimics biological amino acids in order to study its effect in killing Staphylococcus aureus, a gram (+) and Escherichia coli, a gram (-) bacteria.

Synthesis of synthetic mimics enriched tryptophan copolymers for the use in antimicrobial studies

253rd National Meeting (2017)

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