Engineered Viruses Fight Drug-Resistant Bacteria

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Boston University have engineered a virus that attacks bacterial defense systems, strengthening the effects of antibiotics.

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria are an increasing health risk, and the development of new antibiotics is slow and expensive. But researchers have developed another solution by engineering existing bacteriophages (viruses that infect bacteria) to attack specific bacterial targets. The engineered viruses attack the SOS system, the DNA repair system that activates when bacteria are exposed to antibiotics that damage DNA. Used with conventional antibiotics, the new viruses undermine the natural defenses of bacteria and prevent them from repairing the damage and surviving to become resistant.

The engineered bacteriophages were tested with three families of antibiotics (quinolones, beta-lactams and aminoglyclosides) in mice and had promising results with all three. The possibility exists of developing an entire "library" of customized bacteriophages to be used in conjunction with existing antibiotics.

These results were published in the March 2nd issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Source: ScienceDaily