ATPLite detection reagents were added at 4 l/well. other potential Momelotinib Mesylate Momelotinib Mesylate antifungal agents against were excluded, which may avoid unnecessary therapeutic trials and reveals the limited therapeutic alternatives for this outbreak. In summary, this study has demonstrated that drug repurposing screens can be quickly conducted within a useful time-frame. This would allow clinical implementation of identified alternative therapeutics and should be considered as part of Momelotinib Mesylate the initial public health response to new outbreaks or rapidly-emerging microbial pathogens. Introduction Unusual or highly antibiotic resistant organisms may subject large numbers of individuals to unexpected infectious diseases due to greater globalization that brings more widespread distribution networks and potential threats such as bioterrorism. Limited therapeutic options or failures in conventional therapy during these outbreaks can be encountered because of either intolerable drug toxicities or lack of efficacious drugs. Recently, a large outbreak of fungal infections has been caused by the widespread distribution of contaminated preservative-free methylprednisolone acetate prepared by a single compounding pharmacy [1], [2], [3], [4]. It has currently resulted in 741 infections with 55 deaths [5]. is sensitive to amphotericin B, a commonly used antifungal agent, but the severe and potentially lethal side-effects of this drug have limited its use in certain patients. While traditional antibiotic susceptibility testing has provided initial recommendations of using amphotericin B for treatment, the advanced age (median 69) of the patient population in this outbreak has limited the therapeutic efficacy in many patients, mainly due to drug toxicity. There are few alternative drugs that are known for the treatment of infections caused by hyphae and conidia in an ATP content assay format for high throughput screening. Both assays were screened in parallel against two known compound libraries including 4096 approved drugs and 1280 compounds with pharmacologically known activities. Within seven weeks, the activities of 20 known antifungals, 8 other anti-infectious agents and 10 other drugs against were identified from the screens. While some of these drugs may be considered as alternative therapeutics to treat infections, others could serve as tools for identification of new molecular targets for future drug development. Materials and Methods Materials Amphotericin B (catalog # A9528) was purchased from Sigma-Aldrich (St. Louis, MO). The ATP content kit (ATPlite, catalog No. 6016941) was purchased from PerkinElmer (Waltham, MA). PBS (Catalog No. 10010049) was purchased from Life technologies. The 1536-well white sterile tissue culture treated polystyrene plates (Catalog No. 789092-F) were purchased from Greiner Bio-One (Monroe, NC). Preparation of conidia and hyphal fragments Conidia and hyphae of were obtained as described by Richard et al. [16], with the following modifications. Briefly, conidia were harvested from Potato Dextrose Agar (PDA) cultured media with 0.05% Tween 80, and the conidial suspension was filtered using a Cell Strainer (100 m, BD Falcon REF 352340). After centrifugation at 700for 10 min, the suspension was decanted and conidia were resuspended at 1105 per ml in RPMI and counted in a hemocytometer. Hyphae were harvested from yeast extract peptone dextrose (YPD) culture media with 0.05% Tween 80. Hyphal fragments were sized by vortexing 15 sec twice with 0.4 mm glassbeads, and the hyphae suspension was filtered by cheese cloth twice. Microscopy was used to determine the size of hyphal fragments, which ranged between 10C50 m. To normalize concentrations of hyphal fragments for batch to batch consistency, carbohydrate analysis was performed by a phenol-sulfuric acid method as previously described [17]. The final stock concentration of hyphae was adjusted to 1 1.0 (OD490) per 100 l. Mammalian cell culture Human neuroblastoma SH-SY5Y cell line (Catalog No. CRL-2266) Rabbit Polyclonal to RAD17 was purchased from ATCC (Manassas, VA). SH-SY5Y cell line was cultured in 175-cm2 tissue culture flasks (Costar, Cambridge, MA) with 30 ml of growth medium at 37C in a 5% CO2 humidified atmosphere. Growth medium was made with Dulbecco’s Modified Eagle Medium: Nutrient Mixture F-12 with 10%.