Recent reports on the interaction of cardiotoxin and melittin with phospholipid model membranes are reviewed and analyzed. These types of peptide toxins are able to modulate lipid surface curvature and polymorphism in a highly lipid-specific way. It is demonstrated that the remarkable variety of effects of melittin on the organization of different membrane phospholipids can be understood in a r...

The present study illustrates elements of the signal cascades involved in the activation of taurine efflux pathways in myotubes derived from skeletal muscle cells. Exposing primary skeletal muscle cells, loaded with (14)C-taurine, to 1) hypotonic media, 2) the phospholipase A(2) (PLA(2)) activator melittin, 3) anoxia, or 4) lysophosphatidyl choline (LPC) causes an increase in (14)C-taurine rele...

Molinets, Zachary B. M. S., Purdue University, August 2014. Investigation Into the Control of Melittin Secondary Structure and Antimicrobial Activity. Major Professor: Jean A. Chmielewski. Antimicrobial resistance has been an exponentially growing problem since the discovery of antibiotics. Antibiotics have been misused for many years and this misuse has grown into a real problem for the medica...

Staphylokinase (Sak) is a plasminogen activator protein that is secreted by many Staphylococcus aureus strains. Sak also offers protection by binding and inhibiting specific antimicrobial peptides (AMPs). Here, we evaluate Sak as a more general interaction partner for AMPs. Studies with melittin, mCRAMP, tritrpticin and bovine lactoferricin indicate that the truncation of the first ten residues...

We describe, in a system whose uniqueness is that the presence of pores allows the volume to vary as budding proceeds, how phase separation on the surface of spheres extrudes material in the process called "budding". The system is giant phospholipid vesicles (GUVs) containing phase-separated regions of DOPC (soft, liquid) and DPPC (stiff, gel), with cholesterol and without it. Budding is trigge...

Acholeplasma laidlawii is a well-suited model for studying the molecular basis for adapting mollicutes to environmental conditions. Here, we present the whole-genome sequences of two strains of A. laidlawii with increased resistance to tetracycline and melittin.

Borrelia burgdorferi has demonstrated a capacity to resist the in vitro effects of powerful eukaryotic and prokaryotic metabolic inhibitors. However, treatment of laboratory cultures on Barbour-Stoenner-Kelly medium with melittin, a 26-amino acid peptide contained in honeybee venom, showed immediate and profound inhibitory effects when they were monitored by dark-field microscopy, field emissio...