Festa, RossellaAmbrosio, Rosa LuisaLamas Freire, AlexandreGratino, LorenaPalmieri, GiannaFranco Abuín, Carlos ManuelCepeda Sáez, AlbertoAnastasio, Aniello2021-08-062021-08-062021Foods 2021, 10(6), 1372; https://doi.org/10.3390/foods10061372http://hdl.handle.net/10347/26708Antimicrobial resistance has become one of the major global public health concerns, and it is indispensable to search for alternatives to conventional antibiotics. Recently, antimicrobial peptides have received great attention because of their broad-spectrum antimicrobial activity at relatively low concentrations, even against pathogens such as Salmonella enterica, which is responsible for most food-borne illnesses. This work aimed at evaluating the antimicrobial and antibiofilm activity of the innate defense peptide, named 1018-K6, against S. enterica. A total of 42 strains, belonging to three different subspecies and 32 serotypes, were included in this study. The antibiotic resistance profile of all the strains and the cytotoxic effects of 1018-K6 on mammalian fibroblast cells were also investigated. Results revealed that MIC (minimum inhibitory concentrations) and MBC (minimum bactericidal concentrations) values were in the ranges of 8–64 μg/mL and 16–128 μg/mL, respectively, although most strains (97%) showed MICs between 16 and 32 μg/mL. Moreover, sub-inhibitory concentrations of 1018-K6 strongly reduced the biofilm formation in several S. enterica strains, whatever the initial inoculum size. Our results demonstrated that 1018-K6 is able to control and manage S. enterica growth with a large potential for applications in the fields of active packaging and water disinfectantseng© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).Atribución 4.0 Internacionalhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Antimicrobial peptideSalmonellaFood-borne pathogenBiofilm1018-k16Food preservativesjournal article10.3390/foods100613722304-8158open access