Bacteriological Testing of Novel Flavonoids Against Antibiotic Resistant Staphylococcus aureus

Presenter Information

Felipe Santana
Jacob Darley
Eric Foss

Document Type

Oral Presentation

Campus where you would like to present

SURC Ballroom C/D

Start Date

16-5-2013

End Date

16-5-2013

Abstract

An urgent problem facing medicine is the growing number of bacterial species forming resistance to one or more common antibiotics. The need to find other treatments has lead to the isolation and characterization of natural compounds, including a family of biologically active chemicals known as flavonoids. These compounds are present in photosynthesizing organisms and have been shown to have anti-microbial, anti-oxidant, anti-cancer, and anti-inflammatory properties. In a collaborative project between the Chemistry and Biology Departments, we have isolated and characterized four novel flavonoids from Dalea searlsiae, a local prairie clover. From crude root extracts, we performed disk diffusion assays against Staphylococcus aureus to identify anti-bacterial fractions. These fractions were further separated using column chromatography and the disk diffusion assay was repeated until pure compounds were obtained. After isolation and characterization of these four flavonoids, we used a broth dilution method to determine minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) of the compounds against oxacillin sensitive S. aureus (OSSA) and oxacillin resistant S. aureus (ORSA). We found that the flavonoids have MICs of 5 μg/mL against both OSSA and ORSA compared to oxacillin MICs of 0.5 μg/mL and greater than 16 μg/mL, respectively. This indicates that our flavonoids function to inhibit bacterial growth through an independent mechanism compared to oxacillin. A novel antibiotic could possibly replace or augment compounds in the medical establishment’s antibiotic arsenal.

Poster Number

28

Faculty Mentor(s)

Eric Foss

Additional Mentoring Department

Biological Sciences

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May 16th, 8:20 AM May 16th, 10:50 AM

Bacteriological Testing of Novel Flavonoids Against Antibiotic Resistant Staphylococcus aureus

SURC Ballroom C/D

An urgent problem facing medicine is the growing number of bacterial species forming resistance to one or more common antibiotics. The need to find other treatments has lead to the isolation and characterization of natural compounds, including a family of biologically active chemicals known as flavonoids. These compounds are present in photosynthesizing organisms and have been shown to have anti-microbial, anti-oxidant, anti-cancer, and anti-inflammatory properties. In a collaborative project between the Chemistry and Biology Departments, we have isolated and characterized four novel flavonoids from Dalea searlsiae, a local prairie clover. From crude root extracts, we performed disk diffusion assays against Staphylococcus aureus to identify anti-bacterial fractions. These fractions were further separated using column chromatography and the disk diffusion assay was repeated until pure compounds were obtained. After isolation and characterization of these four flavonoids, we used a broth dilution method to determine minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) of the compounds against oxacillin sensitive S. aureus (OSSA) and oxacillin resistant S. aureus (ORSA). We found that the flavonoids have MICs of 5 μg/mL against both OSSA and ORSA compared to oxacillin MICs of 0.5 μg/mL and greater than 16 μg/mL, respectively. This indicates that our flavonoids function to inhibit bacterial growth through an independent mechanism compared to oxacillin. A novel antibiotic could possibly replace or augment compounds in the medical establishment’s antibiotic arsenal.