New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
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Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
#2> hundreds of complete bacterial genomes never seen before
Welllll that doesn’t sound like a great idea
Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
#3> hundreds of complete bacterial genomes never seen before Welllll that doesn’t sound like a great idea
Just because you don't know they are there doesn't mean they aren't there!
Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
#4> hundreds of complete bacterial genomes never seen before Welllll that doesn’t sound like a great idea
Meh, they came from the soil. It's always been here, just never seen by human eyes. That's true of lots and lots of bacteria though - we find new species pretty much every single time we take a stomach sample from someone, let alone random forest soil.
Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
#5Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
#6> hundreds of complete bacterial genomes never seen before Welllll that doesn’t sound like a great idea
Meh, they came from the soil. It's always been here, just never seen by human eyes. That's true of lots and lots of bacteria though - we find new species pretty much every single time we take a stomach sample from someone, let alone random forest soil.
Many bacteria have commensal lifestyles —- scientists don’t feel in control if they can’t culture bacteria in isolation but in nature many bacteria aren’t metabolically complete and son’s live in isolation.
Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
#7This should be re-titled something like: with 200x longer sequences and making products without culturing, dirt can make antibiotic gold.
The two prospects:
Erutacidin, disrupts bacterial membranes through an uncommon interaction with the lipid cardiolipin and is effective against even the most challenging drug-resistant bacteria.
trigintamicin, acts on a protein-unfolding motor known as ClpX, a rare antibacterial target
The difficulty with bacterial DNA is that they have common elements and actively share DNA to boot. Sequencing only short sections make genome assembly unreliable. 200x longer sequences makes much more accurate genomes.
Then even if you find genes, we can't usually culture enough bacteria to make the product (typically instead injecting the sequences into bacteria we can culture). So being able to make the product without culturing the organism is key.
Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
#8This should be re-titled something like: with 200x longer sequences and making products without culturing, dirt can make antibiotic gold. The two prospects: Erutacidin, disrupts bacterial membranes through an uncommon interaction with the lipid cardiolipin and is effective against even the most challenging drug-resistant bacteria. trigintamicin, acts on a protein-unfolding motor known as ClpX, a rare antibacterial ta…
Spoiler, I haven't read the article, but my understanding is cardiolipin targeting antibiotics have failed in the past because our mitochondria are enriched for it. (Which makes sense here because the mitochondria are derived from ancient bacteria). I'm sure there is potential for optimization for medical applications, but we will have to be very careful for adverse effects.
Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
#9> hundreds of complete bacterial genomes never seen before Welllll that doesn’t sound like a great idea
There are millions on the lower bound of bacteria species we havn't identified, trillions on the upper bound. Unknown bacteria are literally everywhere, but the simple act of finding and sequencing them is nothing to be afraid of.
Re: New bacteria, and two potential antibiotics, discovered in soil
#10Look at the 1940s/1950s when some classic antibiotics were discovered. Pharma workers taking vacations overseas were asked to bring soil samples back to the lab. Great reading if you enjoy science history.
https://asm.org/articles/2023/june/hunting-for-antibiotics-i...