Disease treatment via antimicrobial peptides or their inhibitors

Abstract

The invention provides methods for the treatment of disease and promotion of healing that include providing a therapeutically effective amount of a mammalian antimicrobial peptide (AMP) or analog thereof, in particular a cathelicidin or cathelicidin fragment or cathelicidin analog, thereby treating the disease in the subject in need thereof. The invention also provides specific analogs or fragments of cathelicidin that function as agonists, as do endogenous cathelicidins, or as either dominant negatives or as inhibitors to endogenous cathelicidin or to other endogenous AMPs or that compete with pro-inflammatory agents or fragments of AMPs on cognate receptors without inducing disease.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A method for treating in a mammal a central nervous system disease or disorder, selected from the group consisting of neurodegenerative disease, multiple sclerosis and autoimmune Encephalitis, the method comprising administering to a subject in need thereof, a therapeutically effective amount of a cathelicidin peptide selected from mCRAMP (SEQ ID NO: 61) or LL-37 (SEQ ID NO: 14). 
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the mammal is a human. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the cathelicidin peptide is mCRAMP (SEQ ID NO:61). 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the cathelicidin is LL-37 (SEQ ID NO: 14). 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the method is a method of treating central nervous system disease. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the method is a method of treating neurodegenerative disease. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the method is a method of treating multiple sclerosis. 
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein the method is a method of treating Autoimmune Encephalitis.