UNIVERSITY OF KENT
The emergence of drug-resistant bacteria is a global threat to human health, and the development of new antibiotics from scratch is an extremely expensive and time-consuming process. To address this urgent issue, researchers from the University of Kent’s School of Biosciences have combined computational and microbiology laboratory approaches to identify existing drugs that can be repurposed to combat antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections.
This research, which has been published in the Journal of Infectious Diseases, revealed that a class of steroid drugs currently used in hormone replacement therapy (HRT) can also stop the growth of antibiotic-resistant E. coli and effectively kill MRSA. These drugs are particularly good at binding to a protein complex, cytochrome bd, which is important for the growth and survival of a range of disease-causing bacterial species. It is expected that steroids may provide an alternative to conventional antibiotics that are becoming increasingly ineffective.
Dr Mark Shepherd, Reader in Microbial Biochemistry at Kent and the corresponding author on the paper, said: ‘These exciting developments will help to advance research into new antimicrobials, and we are enthusiastic to use our powerful experimental approach to discover drugs that can target other bacterial proteins and combat a wide range of antibiotic-resistant infections.’
The article ‘Steroid Drugs Inhibit Bacterial Respiratory Oxidases and Are Lethal Toward Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus’ is published in the Journal of Infectious Diseases (University of Kent: Samantha A. Henry, Calum M. Webster, Mark N. Wass, Gary K. Robinson and Mark Shepherd). doi: 10.1093/infdis/jiad540/7603360
JOURNAL
The Journal of Infectious Diseases
DOI
10.1093/infdis/jiad540/7603360
METHOD OF RESEARCH
Computational simulation/modeling
SUBJECT OF RESEARCH
Cells
ARTICLE TITLE
Steroid drugs used for HRT can combat E. coli and MRSA
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
13-Feb-2024
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