PNAs: "eavesdropping" bacteria "talking" is more effective than killing bacteria

Biochemists at the University of Illinois found that bacteria of the same species communicate with each other when their survival is threatened This study shows that by manipulating the information transmitted by these microorganisms, bacterial infection can be slowed down, so that the body can overcome the infection The most important thing is that this treatment does not induce bacterial resistance American biochemist professor Satish Nair, Shi Hui Dong postdoctoral and other co researchers said that bacteria can survive in almost all parts of the earth, including the crater and the north and south poles In addition, bacteria can adapt to the new environment quickly Human beings can evolve, so can bacteria If there is no way to survive, they will evolve to adapt to the environment When bacteria compete with other microbes for scarce resources, more successful populations will produce a special antibiotic to kill other species When a group of bacterial population grows too fast, the nutrition they need for survival is not enough, the bacterial population will produce another unique molecule, which will put itself into dormancy until the environment can provide more food Since the discovery of penicillin, the world's first antibiotic, by British bacteriologist Fleming in 1928, we have been using antibiotic molecules to let one microorganism kill another Unfortunately, bacteria quickly become resistant to antibiotics, making them ineffective or ineffective On average, almost every bacterium is resistant to at least one antibiotic Two years ago, researchers in Europe and Asia discovered a so-called "superbug" that is resistant to almost all known antibiotics Bacteria transmit antibiotic related information to other bacteria through chemical signals, which makes it easy for bacteria to share drug resistance, and many bacteria share different drug resistance, which is why they can develop drug resistance so quickly The results show that isovaleryl COA can activate the quorum sensing signal N-acyl-homoserine lactone (AHL) is one of the most important signal molecules in bacterial quorum sensing system (discovered by John woodland Hastings, an American biochemist, in the late 1960s) It regulates the expression of some physiological characteristics in a density dependent manner, i.e quorum sensing (QS) The reaction mechanism of N-acyl-homoserine-lactone (AHL) synthetase is shown in the following figure: the reaction mechanism of N-acyl-homoserine-lactone (AHL) synthetase (source: PNAs), an important participant in the latest research, Shi Hui Dong postdoctoral believed that the abuse of broad-spectrum antibiotics and antibiotics resulted in the generation of drug resistance Because antibiotics kill many kinds of bacteria, even good ones can be killed, and the surviving bacteria find ways to adapt to antibiotics and share their strategies with other bacteria The key to the new study is to block the "language" or group signals that bacteria communicate, so as to slow down the growth of bacteria to treat diseases and prevent infection, rather than killing bacteria directly like antibiotics The researchers believe that only by understanding how bacteria generate dormancy signals can we specifically disrupt the information exchange between bacteria, and this method basically does not make bacteria resistant Therefore, it is more effective to slow down the growth of bacteria than to kill them Thesis link: http://