An interaction between lysozyme and penicillin

Abstract

Collins & Richmond (1962) have drawn attention to the close structural similarity between the reactive groups of penicillin and the reactive groups of N -acetylmuramic acid and, knowing that penicillin interferes with the synthesis of the bacterial cell wall, they have suggested that the antibiotic activity might possibly be explained in terms of a confusion between these two molecules by the cell wall synthesizing enzymes. Although recent work (Anderson, Matsukashi, Haskin & Strominger 1965; Wise & Park 1965; Tipper & Strominger 1965) has shown that penicillin appears to act by blocking the peptide cross-linking stage of bacterial cell wall synthesis rather than the polysaccharide polymerization stage, we wondered if lysozyme might bind penicillin purely on the basis of its structural similarity to N -acetylmuramic acid, a molecule for which lysozyme must have a specificity since it is part of the substrate of lysozyme.