In the war against treatment resistant bacteria, scientists may have discovered a powerful new weapon, in the human gut. The digestive tract contains trillions of bacteria competing with other microbes for resources. These microbes use various chemical agents, called amino acid proteins, to fight each other. Researchers at University of Pennsylvania examined thousands of amino acid proteins produced by these microbes to see if these tools could be harnessed to create new antibiotics. The research team pinpointed a few dozen proteins showed the ability to stop bacterial growth. One of the top candidates, called prevotellin-2, demonstrating it is as powerful as one of the top antibiotics currently used to treat multidrug-resistant infections. What makes discovery of the new antibiotic candidate even more encouraging is that it works in a different way than existing antibiotics. This method of exploring the gut microbiome for new types of antimicrobial proteins could help in the urgent search for new antibacterial medications.
Full Story: HealthDay
