Antifungal Properties and Target Evaluation of Three Putative Bacterial Histidine Kinase Inhibitors

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Abstract
Histidine protein kinases have been explored as potential antibacterial drug targets. The recent identification of two-component histidine kinases in fungi has led us to investigate the antifungal properties of three bacterial histidine kinase inhibitors (RWJ-49815, RWJ-49968, and RWJ-61907). All three compounds were found to inhibit growth of the Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Candida albicans strains, with MICs ranging from 1 to 20 μg/ml. However, deletion of SLN1 , the only histidine kinase in S. cerevisiae , did not alter drug efficacy. In vitro kinase assays were performed by using the Sln1 histidine kinase purified from bacteria as a fusion protein to glutathione S -transferase. RWJ-49815 and RWJ-49968 inhibited kinase a 50% inhibitory concentration of 10 μM, whereas RWJ-61907 failed to inhibit at concentrations up to 100 μM. Based on these results, we conclude that these compounds have antifungal properties; however, their mode of action appears to be independent of histidine kinase inhibition.