The production of antimicrobial pep- tides and proteins is an important means of host defense in eukaryotes (1). The larger antimicrobial proteins are of- ten lytic enzymes, nutrient-binding proteins or proteins containing sites that target specif- ic microbial macromolecules. The smaller antimicrobial pep- tides (defined here as peptides containing fewer than 100 amino acids) act, at least in part, by disrupting the structure or function of microbial cell membranes. In the last 20 yers, hundreds of antimicrobial peptides have been found in plants and in the cells and body fluids of multicellualar animals, from mollusks to humans.
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