Researchers mine extinct animals’ proteins for antibiotic peptides

“Molecular de-extinction”

The team calls it molecular de-extinction: reading protein sequences from extinct organisms, preserved in published ancient DNA and protein data, and making the most promising fragments in the lab. Nothing is brought back to life. The point is that evolution tried many molecules that no living species still makes.

The screen

The researchers trained a deep-learning model, APEX, to predict how strongly a peptide sequence would kill different bacteria. They ran it over proteins from extinct organisms, including the woolly mammoth, the straight-tusked elephant, the giant sloth and Neanderthals and Denisovans. The model flagged tens of thousands of possible peptides, most of them not found in any living species.

What worked

The team made 69 of the top candidates. Most killed at least one type of bacterium in a dish. Some, named mammuthusin-2 and elephasin-2 after their sources, reduced bacterial counts in mice with skin abscesses or thigh infections, in some tests about as well as polymyxin B.

Putting it in context

The same lab has used this approach on human proteins, on microbes and later on archaea. The repeated finding is that computer screening raises the hit rate a lot compared with guessing. The repeated limit is that hits are a long way from medicines. The peptides have not been tested for safety in larger animals.

Source Wan F. et al., Nature Biomedical Engineering, August 2024

Amino Weekly reports research. It is not medical advice and never gives doses.