A very important new research from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem might have just discovered an important pattern in how bacteria avoid antibiotic contact and survive in the human body.
This discovery could be a scientific breakthrough that could allow not only better treatment, but also less reliance on antibiotics, which in themselves cause more bacterial resistance.
Although this phenomenon of avoidance is different to simple drug resistance in bacteria, the bacteria who evade the drugs actually do so through a mutation that allows the bugs to go dormant for a certain lapse of time, so that they 'wait' until the drug treatment is completed and exits the body before re-activating.
The mechanism that allows this 'decoy' behavior seems to stem from HIPa, a toxin that occurs in certain bacteria. This study from Hebrew University confims the link between bacteria that persist antibiotic treatment and the toxin.
The study revealed that the toxin actually plays interference with the chemical signals that allows the bacteria to build proteins. This disruption, called the 'hunger signal', renders the bacteria inactive, until the treatment is over. At that point, the HIPa stops disrupting the nutrient metabolism and the bacteria resume their normal activity.
Source: MNT/ 1.3.14
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