The Dangers of Drug-Resistant Bacteria
Researchers found that the new antibiotic, teixobactin, is very effective against Gram-positive bugs, including those responsible for MRSA, pneumonia, and tuberculosis. This is important because many strains of these bugs have become resistant to multiple drugs.
The scientists then performed tests to gauge whether any of the disease-causing bacteria were able to develop mutations that could make them resistant to the new antibiotic.
“By doing that experiment, we didn’t find any resistant colonies—meaning that resistance does not develop through mutation to this antibiotic,” says study author Kim Lewis, Ph.D.
One possible reason: The new antibiotic works by attacking multiple targets in the bacteria, making resistance less likely to occur.
The researchers discovered teixobactin—and 24 other new antibiotics—through a new way of cultivating bacteria that previously couldn’t grow in the lab. Most antibiotics come from microorganisms found in soil. But only 1 percent of those microorganisms can be grown in lab conditions—and since the 1960s, new discovery from that group has been halted. That left the remaining 99 percent as untapped potential.
So the researchers developed a way to “trick” that bacteria into growing by making them believe they were still in their natural environment. This allows the researchers to search that previously unexplored, 99-percent pool for potential antibiotics.
“We have a platform for antibiotic discovery, from which a lot of other compounds will follow,” says Lewis.
As for teixobactin, more research is needed before it can hit the market as a drug. Lewis estimates that clinical trials in humans—which will last about 3 years—may begin 2 years from now.
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