Alligator Blood vs E.Coli

by Jordan Yerman | April 16, 2008 at 11:36 am

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Alligaotrs live in some pretty unhygenic areas: swamps, bogs, marshes... so their blood contains some serious antimicrobial properties. Scientists are using 'gator blood to fight human pathongens, including the nasty E.coli.

Researchers hunting for new antibiotics might get some aid from gator blood. Scientists are zeroing in on snippets of proteins found in American alligator blood that kill a wide range of disease-causing microbes and bacteria, including the formidable MRSA or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus.

While alligators' immune response is mighty in some regards—they rarely develop tumors, for example—the beasts are by no means immune to all ills, notes Elliott Jacobson of the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine in Gainesville. Thirty-three alligators died and 13 more were euthanized when an epidemic caused by mycoplasma, the bacterial group responsible for pneumonia, swept through a gator farm in Florida in 1995.

In addition, the blood was able to deplete and destroy a significant amount of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

Okay, that last bit really caught my attention. The National Geographic article (above) mentions the existence of such peptides in Komodo dragons (which use their skankiness as a weapon, biting prey and waiting for infection to do the dirty work for them).
Also not mentioned was any possibility of alligator serum turning the recipient into a super-villain.