engleski

Antimicrobial activity of quinuclidine based cationic surfactants against Listeria monocytogenes

Listeria monocytogenes is a rapidly growing Gram-positive food pathogen that causes listeriosis in humans which, if untreated, can lead to serious and often fatal consequences. Once L. monocytogenes are organized in biofilm structures, they are more resistant to antibiotics and as such pose a great challenge to scientists [1]. One of the most powerful antimicrobial agents are quaternary ammonium compounds (QAC) that are widely used as antiseptics in homes and hospitals worldwide. As amphiphilic compounds, these agents interact with negative bacterial membranes causing an osmotic imbalance that subsequently leads to perforation of the cell wall structure. For this reason, QAC are considered as agents of a broad spectrum antibacterial activity. However, a worrisome number of bacterial strains isolated from the environment have become resistant to commercial QAC highlighting the importance of new drug discoveries [2]. An underexplored natural QAC that has promising medicinal and pharmaceutical potential is a quinuclidine isolated from the cinchona tree. Our group has previously shown that quinuclidine based QAC have good antibacterial potential, especially toward Gram-positive bacterial strains [3]. Motivated by these observations, we were interested whether QAC consisting of a quinuclidine core and long side alkyl chains (C12 and C14) exhibit antimicrobial activity against L. monocytogenes and whether these compounds have an effect on a biofilm formation. Our results indicate that quinuclidine derived QAC have a promising antimicrobial activity against L. monocytogenes with MIC and MBC values of up to 3.9 µg mL-1. An upcoming research on the fractional inhibitory concentration and antimicrobial activity against biofilm structures will showcase its benefit in manifold applications.

Quaternary ammonium compounds (QAC) ; Surfactnats ; Quinuclidine ; Antimicrobial activity ; Listeria monocytogenes

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