Abstract

Bacterial infections are the most important cause of severe diseases. Antibiotics are the only major option to cure these infections. Most of the bacteria (approximately 90 %) have an extracellular polymeric substance layer forming a biofilm that allows them to resist the antimicrobial agents. It enables them to develop resistance against multiple drugs. As it is a tedious task to develop novel antimicrobial agents, there is a serious need to adopt alternative strategies. To counter the multidrug resistance in the bacteria, antimicrobial peptides have been developed and used. Antimicrobial peptides are potent antibiofilm agents possessing a promising broad spectrum of activity for the treatment of a variety of infections caused by bacteria, viruses and fungi. However, some of these peptides have a very short half-life in different species of microorganisms. Some antimicrobial peptides even produce toxic effects. Hence, there is a need to continuously develop safe and effective peptide analogues to be used as potential antibiofilm agents. The present review highlights the mechanism of the development of resistance towards antimicrobial agents and the role of antimicrobial peptides as antibiofilm agents in combating this resistance with a critical analysis of their benefits and limitations. In addition, an attempt has been made to review the latest developments on antimicrobial peptides along with their applications and patents published/granted thereon.