An in silico study of Escherichia coli biofilms of Medical importance

Abstract

Medical biofilms being a ubiquitous challenge may be managed with newer and safer drug options like phytochemical derivatives There is a dire need to control central venous catheter CVC related catheter related blood stream infections CRBSIs more so using environment and human friendly alternatives The first step in combating Escherichia coli biofilms formed on in dwelling medical devices is by designing a trajectory to manage biofilm infections with newer and safer drug options like phytochemical derivatives This in silico study employed subtractive proteomic techniques coupled with network topology analyses to study protein protein interactions in E coli FliJ the membrane protein of E coli consisting of 147 amino acids plays a role in the energy coupling mechanism for bacterial flagellar protein export By targeting the most interactive protein fliJ with the phytochemical compounds like geranyl and ferulic acids it is possible that potential inhibition of the protein may be achieved thereby disturbing the interaction and subsequent difficulty in forming the biofilm as fliJ is an important protein responsible for attachment which is the first step in biofilm formation These ferulic acids and geranyl phosphates are found in common plants and hence their derivatives may be easily obtained from rice wheat oats and seeds of apple ferulic acid and citrus plants mango fruit and parsley geranyl pyrophosphate Combinatorial derivatives of these acids offer an array of molecules which can be assessed for their activity against biofilms and enable the development on lead molecules which may act on the biofilms newline