A new antifungal peptide from rice beans.

A peptide, possessing a molecular mass of 5 kDa and demonstrating remarkable sequence homology to the cowpea 10 kDa protein precursor and garden pea disease resistance response protein, was isolated from rice bean seeds. The peptide was adsorbed on CM-Sepharose and Affi-gel blue gel. It inhibited mycelial growth in the fungi Botrytis cinerea, Fusarium oxysporum, Rhizoctonia solani and Mycosphaerella arachidicola. It stimulated incorporation of methyl [3H] thymidine into mouse splenocytes, inhibited the activity of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 reverse transcriptase and suppressed translation by rabbit reticulocyte lysate.