Scientists have proven that the substance is effective against both fungal and pathogenic plant diseases
Newly discovered group of natural productskeanumycins in bacteria are effective against the plant pest Botrytis cinerea, which causes gray mold and leads to huge crop losses every year. But the active ingredient also inhibits fungi that are dangerous to humans, such as Candida albicans. According to previous studies, it is harmless to plant and human cells.
Bacteria Keanu Reeves
Thus, keanumycins can bean environmentally friendly alternative to chemical pesticides, but they can also offer an alternative in the fight against resistant fungi. “We are in an anti-infective crisis,” explains Sebastian Götze, first author of the study and postdoctoral fellow at Leibniz-HKI. "Many human pathogenic fungi are currently resistant to antifungal drugs, in part because they are used in large quantities in agricultural fields."
The fact is that now researchers have found a newthe active substance in bacteria of the genus Pseudomonas is not accidental. “We have been working with Pseudomonas for some time and we know that many of these bacterial species are very toxic to amoebas that feed on bacteria,” says study leader Pierre Stolfort. He is Head of the Department of Paleobiotechnology at the Leibniz-HKI and Professor of Bioorganic Chemistry and Paleobiotechnology at the Friedrich Schiller University Jena. It appears that several toxins are responsible for the lethal effect of the bacteria, of which only one has been known so far. In the genome of bacteria, researchers have found genes for the biosynthesis of recently discovered natural products - ceanumycins A, B and C. This group of natural products belongs to non-ribosomal lipopeptides with soap-like properties.
Together with colleagues from the biopilot plantLeibniz-HKI researchers were able to isolate one of the ceanumycins and conduct further tests. “Lipopeptides kill so effectively that we named them after Keanu Reeves, because he is also extremely deadly in his roles,” Goetze explains with a wink.
Researchers suspected that keanumycins alsocan kill fungi, because in some characteristics they resemble amoebas. This assumption was confirmed in cooperation with the Horticultural Research Center of the Erfurt University of Applied Sciences. There, Keanumycin was shown to be effective against gray mold on hydrangea leaves. In this case, the culture fluid, which no longer contained bacterial cells, was sufficient to significantly suppress the growth of the fungus.
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