Resistance is futile: the bacteriocin model for addressing the antibiotic resistance challenge

Abstract

Pathogenic bacteria resistant to many or all antibiotics already exist. With the decline in microbiological research at pharmaceutical companies, the high rate at which resistance has evolved and spread has demanded a novel approach to addressing this critical human health issue. In the present paper, we propose a new paradigm in antibiotic discovery and development, one that applies ecological and evolutionary theory to design antimicrobial drugs that are more difficult and/or more costly to resist. In essence, we propose to simply adopt the strategies invented and applied by bacteria for hundreds of millions of years. Our research focuses on bacteriocins, powerful biological weapons, and their use as alternative therapeutics in human health.

Within-host competitive interactions as a mechanism for the maintenance of parasite diversity

“…In fact, the health benefits of many probiotics are thought to be due in part to their effectiveness in interference competition [100]. Interest in using bacteriocins as an alternative to traditional, broadspectrum antibiotics is growing [101][102][103]. Historically, the narrow killing range of bacteriocins limited their utility; however, faster diagnostic tests, the ability to engineer bacteriocins to target novel sites [104], and our awareness of the consequences of using broad-spectrum antibiotics has made the therapeutic use of bacteriocins more viable.…”

The therapeutic potential of bacteriocins as protein antibiotics

“…Taking this into consideration, only those mice that received enterocoliticin 1 h after infection and were analyzed 5 h later can inform on the effect of the tailocin, and these mice did indeed show significantly reduced bacterial numbers (Table 1) [49]. Unfortunately, many CLBs and tailocins that were shown to be active in vivo [50][51][52][53][54][55] cannot be identified today, due to incoherent naming and lack of identification of the active molecules (Table 1).…”

Evaluation of Antimicrobial and Antioxidant Properties of Pithecolobine Isolated fromAlbizia saman

“…The increasing failures of synthetic chemotherapeutics and serious side effects caused by synthetic drugs have collectively necessitated the need to look for alternative strategies (11,20). In the past two decades, there has been increasing interest in searching for new and broad-spectrum drugs from natural products as alternatives to synthetic chemicals (14,21). Alkaloids are important bioactive substances and have been reported for their various bioactivities (1,6).…”