Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Scientific Correspondence
  • Published:

A peptide antibiotic from human skin

Abstract

To avoid opportunistic infections, plants and animals have developed antimicrobial peptides in their epithelia that can form pores in the cytoplasmic membrane of microorganisms1. After contact with microorganisms, vertebrate skin2, trachea and tongue epithelia3 are rich sources of peptide antibiotics1, which may explain the unexpected resistance of these tissues to infection. Here we report that human skin is protected in a similar way by an inducible, transcriptionally regulated, antibiotic peptide, which resembles those in other mammals.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: The deduced amino-acid sequence (single-letter code) of the hBD-2 precursor based on the complementary DNA sequence obtained from humakeratinocytes, with the sequences of bovine tracheal antimicrobial peptide (TAP), bovine lingual antimicrobial peptide (LAP) and human β-defensin-1 (hBD-1), and the β-defensin consensus sequence.
Figure 2: hBD-2 mRNA is upregulated by contact with different microorganisms (upper panel) and constitutively expressed in organs other than skin (lower panel).

References

  1. Boman, H. G. Annu. Rev. Immunol. 13, 61–92 (1995).

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Zasloff, M. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. 84, 5449–5453 (1987).

    Article  ADS  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  3. Schonwetter, B. S., Stolzenberg, E. D. & Zasloff, M. A. Science 267, 1645–1648 (1995).

    Article  ADS  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Henseler, T. & Christophers, E. J. Am. Acad. Dermatol. 32, 982–986 (1995).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Bensch, K. W., Raida, M., Mägert, H.-J., Schulz-Knappe, P. & Forssmann, W.-G. FEBS Lett. 368, 331–335 (1995).

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  6. Zhao, C., Wang, I. & Lehrer, R. I. FEBS Lett. 396, 319–322 (1996).

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  7. Smith, J. J., Travis, S. M., Greenberg, E. P. & Welsh, M. J. Cell 85, 229–236 (1996).

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. Goldman, M. J. et al. Cell 88, 553–560 (1997).

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Schröder, J.-M., Gregory, H., Young, J. & Christophers, E. J. Invest. Dermatol. 98, 241–247 (1992).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Bartels, J. et al. Biochem. Biophys. Res. Comm. 225, 1045–1051 (1996).

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Harder, J., Bartels, J., Christophers, E. et al. A peptide antibiotic from human skin. Nature 387, 861 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1038/43088

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/43088

This article is cited by

Comments

By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.

Search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing