oa Editorial [Hot Topic: Enzyme Inhibitors as New Drugs for Microbial Diseases Control: Part II (Guest Editor: Alane Beatriz Vermelho)]

The purpose of this second special issue on the theme “Enzyme inhibitors as new drugs for microbial disease control” is to present some of the latest research carried out in this area and the important developments in this field. This supplement focuses on the fungal aspartic peptidases, bacterial zinc peptidases, and peptidases from Leishmania and Trypanosome cruzi and their inhibitors. Peptidases are an important target for the development of new antimicrobial agents because they play a major role in the parasite-host -cell interaction and participate in numerous processes in the microbial physiology. In the last few years much progress has been made in the design and in clinical applications of peptidase inhibitors. In this context potential peptidase inhibitors have been developed for parasitic diseases. In addition, bacterial peptidases have been evidenced in the pathogenesis of microbial infections, and currently these are a target for disease control. The first review in this special issue, written by Dr. Supuran and Mastrolorenzo concerns the generation of inhibitors of Bacterial zinc peptidases. Zinc peptidases are present in many bacterial species, some of which cause serious disease such as Listeria, Vibrio, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Legionella pneumophila, Clostridium spp and Enterococcus spp. Recently many peptidomimetic and non-peptide inhibitors have been discovered for these enzymes and some are being evaluated for pharmacological development. The second review by Dr. Almeida Rodrigues et al. presents an overview that focuses on the phytochemicals which are able to inhibit specific Trypanosoma spp. and Leishmania spp. enzymes. The next review by Dr. Bauerova et al. discusses the possibility of using vacuolar or GPI-anchored aspartic peptidase inhibitors against the genus Candida spp. that represents a serious threat to immunocompromised Individuals. In the last manuscript Dr. Soares has reviewed the peptidase inhibitors with antileishmanial activity covering the recent findings in the literature. Current chemotherapy of leishmaniases has limited efficiency, toxic side effects and presents drug resistance. As guest editor, I am grateful to the authors for providing their reviews on this important matter. We thank the reviewers for their useful comments on the manuscripts submitted to this issue.