Antimicrobial peptides play a central role in the innate defense system and it has became the hot topic in the research of new type anti-infectious drugs because it’s not easy to develop drug-resistance in most microorganisms. The research team led by Prof. Lai Ren of the Kunming institute of zoology, CAS has done a lot of work in exploring and developing the antimicrobial peptides and characterized more than 500 types of antimicrobial peptides. Cathelicidin and Definsin are the most important antimicrobial peptides in vertebrates. Cathelicidin has been characterized in fishs, reptiles, birds and mammals, but has not been found in amphibians. Recently, this team has characterized the first amphibian Cathelicidin antimicrobial peptide in the world, which fills the evolutionary gap of cathelicidin in vertebrate. This work has been published in Amino Acids. 2011 Oct 19[Epub ahead of print], with the title: Amphibian cathelicidin fills the evolutionary gap of cathelicidin in vertebrate.