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A mini-review: mechanism of antimicrobial action and application of surfactin

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Abstract

Surfactin, an antibacterial lipopeptide produced by different strains of Bacillus subtilis, is a powerful biosurfactant. It also has multiple biological activities including antiviral, anti-mycoplasma and antiprotozoal activities, in addition to the broad-spectrum antimicrobial activities against Gram-positive bacteria, Gram-negative bacteria and fungi. Surfactin may be one of the promising alternatives to antibiotics. Surfactin’s chemical structure and physicochemical properties are briefly discussed in this mini-review. Surfactin’s antibacterial mechanism is mainly outlined as follows: (1) attacking pathogenic bacteria’s cell membrane, causing cell membrane disintegration or osmotic pressure imbalance; (2) inhibiting pathogenic bacteria’s protein synthesis, preventing cell reproduction; (3) inhibiting pathogenic bacteria’s enzyme activity, affecting normal cell metabolism. This provides basis for the further research and application of surfactin. Finally, the application of surfactin in food and its prospect are summarized in brief.

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Funding

This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 32072182).

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XC: writing the manuscript. YL, MS and HZ: editing the manuscript. ZL and YL: revising the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Zhaoxin Lu or Yingjian Lu.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Chen, X., Lu, Y., Shan, M. et al. A mini-review: mechanism of antimicrobial action and application of surfactin. World J Microbiol Biotechnol 38, 143 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11274-022-03323-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11274-022-03323-3

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