Severe sepsis is a disease that causes mortality in 30-50% of patients and there are currently no approved drugs for treating this condition specifically. The goal of this project is to determine the efficacy of theta defensins in a mouse sepsis model. Preliminary epxeriments indicate that the peptides are efficacious, non-toxic, and non-immunosuppressive, and may therefore present a new approach to the treatment of this often fatal disease.

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