Discovery
opens door to drugs for chronic infections
July 12,
2012
A clever
new imaging technique discovered at the University of California, Berkeley,
reveals a possible plan of attack for many bacterial diseases, such as cholera,
lung infections in cystic fibrosis patients and even chronic sinusitis, that
form biofilms that make them resistant to antibiotics.
By devising
a new fluorescent labeling strategy and employing super-resolution light
microscopy, the researchers were able to examine the structure of sticky
plaques called bacterial biofilms that make these infections so tenacious. They
also identified genetic targets for potential drugs that could break up the
bacterial community and expose the bugs to the killing power of antibiotics.
“Eventually,
we want to make these bugs homeless,” said lead researcher Veysel Berk, a
postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Physics and the California Institute
for Quantitative Biosciences (QB3) at UC Berkeley.
read the
rest: