Bacteriocin adalah toksin berprotein yang diproduksi oleh bakteri untuk

menghambat pertumbuhan dari strain bakteri yang mirip atau berkaitan secara
dekat. Mereka umumnya dianggap sebagai antibiotik berspektrum sempit.
Bacteriocin dapat disamakan cara kerjanya dengan ragi dan factor pembunuh pada
paramecium, dan secara struktur, fungsi, dan lingkungannya beragam.
Bacteriocins juga digunakan dalam dunia kedokteran interest in medicine because
they are made by non-pathogenic bacteria that normally colonize the human body.
Loss of these harmless bacteria following antibiotic use may allow opportunistic
pathogenic bacteria to invade the human body .
Bacteriocins dapat menargetkan spesies tertentu dari bakteri secara individual,
target individual bacterial species, or provide broad-spectrum killing of many
microbes. As with today's antibiotics, bacteria can evolve to resist bacteriocins.
However, they can be bioengineered to regain their effectiveness. Further, they
could be produced in the body by intentionally introduced beneficial bacteria, as
some probiotics do.[27]

Farkas-Himsley H, Zhang YS, Yuan M, Musclow CE (1992). "Partially purified

bacteriocin kills malignant cells by apoptosis: programmed cell death". Cell. Mol.
Biol. (Noisy-le-grand) 38 (56): 64351. PMID 1483114.
Jump up ^ Farkas-Himsley H, Musclow CE (1986). "Bacteriocin receptors on
malignant mammalian cells: are they transferrin receptors?". Cell. Mol. Biol. 32 (5):
60717. PMID 3779762

Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) have been used for centuries in the fermentation of a
variety of dairy products. The preservative ability of LAB in foods is attributed to the
production of anti-microbial metabolites including organic acids and bacteriocins.
Bacteriocins generally exert their anti-microbial action by interfering with the cell
wall or the membrane of target organisms, either by inhibiting cell wall biosynthesis
or causing pore formation, subsequently resulting in death. The incorporation of
bacteriocins as a biopreservative ingredient into model food systems has been
studied extensively and has been shown to be effective in the control of pathogenic
and spoilage microorganisms. However, a more practical and economic option of
incorporating bacteriocins into foods can be the direct addition of bacteriocinproducing cultures into food. This paper presents an overview of the potential for
using bacteriocin-producing LAB in foods for the improvement of the safety and
quality of the final product. It describes the different genera of LAB with potential as
biopreservatives, and presents an up-to-date classification system for the
bacteriocins they produce. While the problems associated with the use of some
bacteriocin-producing cultures in certain foods are elucidated, so also are the

situations in which incorporation of the bacteriocin-producer into model food

systems have been shown to be very effective.