AntiProtoZ: An assemblage of antiprotozoal peptides

Protozoan infections cause nearly 3.5 billion cases each year and remain a major global health challenge, due to a lack of effective treatment options and rising drug resistance. Amid this, antiprotozoal peptides have emerged as a promising class of therapeutic agents; however, existing antimicrobial peptide databases lack species-specific retrieval, peptides against free-living protozoan species, and comprehensive coverage of antiprotozoal peptides. To address this gap, we developed AntiProtoZ, the first curated database exclusively focused on antiprotozoal peptides. Through extensive manual curation of literature and existing repositories, we assembled 1240 experimentally validated peptide entries, each annotated with detailed metadata, including physicochemical properties, peptide origin, chemical modifications, activity metrics, and literature references. This rich dataset contains a diverse set of peptides against both parasitic and free-living protozoan species. These comprehensive data are available at the user-friendly and accessible AntiProtoZ web server that provides sequence search options, composition-based filtering, BLAST alignment, real-time statistical visualization, and downloadable datasets in CSV files, enabling direct use in bioinformatics analyses or custom machine-learning development. These features enable researchers to compare peptides, explore sequence–activity trends, and identify candidates for therapeutic development. By focusing exclusively on protozoan targets, AntiProtoZ aims to serve as a centralized, accessible reference for researchers working in antimicrobial discovery, protozoan biology, and neglected tropical diseases. We hope that AntiProtoZ contributes to inspiring and accelerating advances in treatment strategies and the development of next-generation antiprotozoal therapeutics. The database is freely available at http://soodlab.com/antiprotoz/ . • AntiProtoZ is the first curated database and web server dedicated to experimentally validated antiprotozoal peptides. • It offers broader protozoan coverage, including free-living species with superior specific retrieval. • Each entry contains sequence, origin, family, modifications, activity data, target organism, and reference details. • Integrated tools and datasets support sequence mining, ML-ready data creation, and rationale antiprotozoal peptide design.