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. 2019 Oct 31;10:2470. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2019.02470

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Copyright © 2019 Sadgrove and Jones.

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

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An example of the chemical structure of an aminoglycoside (Vancomycin) showing the complexity of just one of some of the frontline antibiotics. Two structures are depicted that are representative of category 1 antimicrobials (Eryzerin C – prenylated flavonoid; Isobavachalcone – prenylated chalcone), which are among the most potent plant derived nitrogen deficient antimicrobial compounds in nature. The prenyl group enhances lipophilicity and bacterial membrane penetration, the adjacent phenolic OH group (on the same ring as the prenyl group) is essential for efficacy. The structural similarity of acyl-D-ala-D-ala to penicillin is important for the specificity of penicillin since human proteins have no D-amino acids. The activity of β-lactamase against penicillin is on the β-lactam moiety, which hydrolyzes the amide bond (Patrick, 2013).