Two laboratory strains of bacteria were obtained from the American Type Culture Collection (ATCC; Virginia, U.S.A.), namely S. aureus ATCC SA29213 and P. aeruginosa ATCC PA27853, to examine the antimicrobial efficacy of the 16 synthetic peptides. The notation following species name indicates the specific strain of that species. For instance, S. aureus ATCC SA29213 and S. aureus ATCC SA25923 are two different strains of S. aureus. S. aureus (a Gram-positive bacteria) and P. aeruginosa (a Gramnegative bacteria) were chosen for this study as they represent two of the important ESKAPE pathogens, which consist of Enterococcus faecium, S. aureus, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Acinetobacteria baumannii, P. aeruginosa, and Enterobacter spp. This group of pathogens have been recognised to be largely responsible for life-threatening nosocomial infections and are the key culprits in AMR-related systemic and non-systemic infections, including infectious keratitis 9,57-60 .