Investigating the anti-parasitic veterinary drug, Imizol, and its potential use for treatment of bacterial infections

Investigating the anti-parasitic veterinary drug, Imizol, and its potential use for treatment of bacterial infections

Imizol is a veterinary drug used to treat protozoan, mainly Babesia spp., parasitic infections found in both horses and dogs. The active ingredient in this medicine is imidocarb dipropionate. This compound has traditionally been used in the veterinary field for treating parasitic infections; however, it has also been shown to inhibit the Yersinia pestis type III secretion system (T3SS) and therefore may have a dual-purpose as an antibacterial drug. T3SSs are found in several pathogenic bacteria and function as adefense against the host’s immune response. Although dipropionate is a known T3SS inhibitor, the exactmechanism it uses to inhibit the T3SS is unknown. Therefore, the goal of this project is to determine how imidocarb dipropionate inhibits the Y. pestis T3SS. This will be accomplished by testing the ability, or inability, of dipropionate to inhibit secretion of various Y. pestis T3SS mutant strains. The mutant strains of Y. pestis will be plated on Magnesium Oxalate Agar and a disk containing the compound will then be placed onto the agar and allowed to incubate at 37°C for 48h. The inhibition of the T3SS is shown by large growth of Y. pestis around the disk, which would indicate that the mutation had no effect on the dipropionate activity. Conversely, the lack of inhibition of the T3SS is shown by little growth of the Y. pestis around the disk which would indicate that the mutation blocked the function of dipropionate and therefore may be the molecular target of the drug.