| Summary: | For thousands of years, Nature has' been considered to be essential for human beings for the treatment of their diseases. Amphibians are an important component of the Animal Kingdom and have played a significant role in sourcing many active compounds and some therapeutics. In the course of this research, genomic and proteomic techniques have been used to investigate the bioactive peptides from the skin secretions of four American amphibian species: the Central American red-eyed leaf frog, Agalychnis callidryas~ the South American orange-legged leaf frog, Phyllomedusa hypochondrialis, Rohde's leaf frog, Phyllomedusa rohdei and the Giant Mexican leaf frog Pachymedusa dacnicolor. The synthetic peptides all exhibited significant biological activities. Medusins were a novel family of antimicrobial peptides found in all species investigated and all possessed a broad-spectrum of antibiotic activity. Phylloseptins were found to be active against both planktonic bacteria and those within biofilms. Bradykinin-like peptides (BRPs) exhibited significant and selective activities on a range of mammalian smooth muscle preparations and one was identified as a B2 receptor antagonist using the rat tail artery. These discoveries of novel peptides from amphibian skin secretions have enriched our knowledge of bioactive peptides from this source and may provide the basis for several drug development programmes.
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