No matter how rapidly developing and inventing new means of treating the pharmaceutical industry. The bacteria will still adapt faster, which leads to the emergence of extremely resistant strains of antibiotics, also known as “superbugs”. To combat them we need “superstability”, one of whom recently managed to obtain an American scientist, by modifying the structure of known vancomycin.
It is believed that the main source of the emergence of “superbugs” are medical facilities and livestock farms, where antibiotics are widely used to accelerate the growth of livestock. Not the last role in the emergence of resistant strains plays and uncontrolled reception of antibiotics. For the creation of a new type of antibiotic meets a group of scientists from the SCRIPPS Institute in La JOLLA, headed by Dr Dale Bougerol. They managed to find a solution to the above problems by modifying the antibiotic vancomycin. Vancomycin is the so-called antibiotic reserve. That is, it is used only when other antibiotics do not work. All reserve antibiotics have a strong antimicrobial action, but if the bacteria will be resistant to it, then the probability of recovery in this case falls to almost zero. Vancomycin is used in medical practice for almost 60 years, and bacteria were going to develop immunity to it.
The team of experts has for several years been developing modified versions of this antibiotic that are not just more efficient, but less vulnerable from the point of view of the development of resistance of bacteria to it. To solve this problem, the researchers analyzed the structure of the molecules of vancomycin and followed the way he interacts with the cell wall of microbes, which revealed all 3 of the most “vulnerable” point in the molecule, which lead to the development of resistance. After this, the researchers changed the structure so that each active point could independently connect with the cell wall of bacteria. In the course of experiments managed to get a molecule, antimicrobially the activity of which is 25 000 times higher than that of the original vancomycin. Moreover, it inhibited the reproduction and even kill those germs that have developed complete resistance to treatment with vancomycin. As stated by the author of the study
“Doctors can use this version of vancomycin without fear that microbes will develop resistance to its molecules. It acts on the bacteria in three different ways, whereby its effectiveness is increased manifold. Germs simply cannot look for ways to solve three different tasks – even if they manage with a mechanism of action, the other two will kill you.”
Based on materials of RIA “news”
Created an antibiotic that kill “superbugs”
Vladimir Kuznetsov