Researchers at Queen’s University Belfast have discovered why a lethal superbug is so resistant to the last line antibiotic meaning potential treatments could now be developed to fight the killer infection.
A compound extracted from a deep-water marine sponge collected near the Bahamas is showing potent antibacterial activity against the drug resistant bacteria methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) also called the “super bug.”
The uncomfortable and embarrassing facial side effects many patients experience from the drug niacin, which is prescribed to prevent heart disease, typically lead to a high number of patients abandoning the therapy. For decades, researchers looking to alleviate the effects surmised that the greater the redness or warmth, the worse the experience for the patient. However, surprising new results from Penn Medicine tell a different story: it is how fast the side effects appear immediately after taking the drug, which the team reports in a paper published online ahead of print in the Journal of Lipid Research.
Over the past two decades there has been a sharp rise in the number and severity of infections caused by the bacteria Clostridium difficile often shortened to C. diff now the most common hospital acquired infection in the United States. But a new study suggests that the most routinely prescribed antibiotic is not the best treatment for severe cases. Scientists at the VA Salt Lake City Health Care System and University of Utah School of Medicine report that patients with a severe C. diff infection (CDI) were less likely to die when treated with the antibiotic vancomycin compared to the standard treatment of metronidazole.
A Michigan State University researcher has developed a faster way to detect the bacteria causing patients to become sick, giving physicians a better chance at saving their lives.
Findings could transform cancer drug development and patient care
In some people, the brain protein tau collects into toxic tangles that damage brain cells and contribute to diseases such as Alzheimer’s. Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found a drug that can lower tau levels and prevent some neurological damage.
Dr. Timothy Anderson, Scientist in the Department of Genetics at Texas Biomedical Research Institute, received a five-year, $4.6 million MERIT Award from the National Institutes of Health.
Researchers have devised a potential drug regimen for tuberculosis that could cut the treatment time by up to 75 percent, while simultaneously reducing the risk that patients could develop drug-resistant TB.
In the journal Cancer Discovery, UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers and colleagues report findings of how triple negative breast cancer cells are able to bypass treatment with trametinib, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration-approved drug that belongs to a class of commonly used anti-cancer drugs called kinase inhibitors. The researchers also reported findings from laboratory models of breast cancer testing a potential treatment approach that could prevent the onset of resistance.
A new tool -- a type of ultraviolet light called UVC -- could aid hospitals in the ongoing battle to keep drug-resistant bacteria from lingering in patient rooms and causing new infections.
Antibiotic use represents a special challenge, in which too much of a good thing can be dangerous to public health as a whole. The fight against a common, costly, hospital-acquired infection known as Clostridium difficile, or C. diff offers an illuminating case study in the area of so-called antibiotic stewardship.
Patients who take medication for depression report more side effects if they also suffer from panic disorder, according to a new study led by researchers from the University of Illinois at Chicago published in the Journal of Clinical Psychiatry.
A collaborative team of researchers from Moffitt Cancer Center’s Integrated Mathematical Oncology (IMO) Program, led by Alexander Anderson, Ph.D., and Oxford University’s Department of Computer Science are using mathematical models to explain how bacteria and cancer cells exploit an evolutionary process known as bet-hedging to resist medical intervention.
In a landmark trial, researchers have demonstrated that when treating children between 9 and 23 months of age with antibiotics for ear infections, a shortened course has worse clinical outcomes without reducing the risk of antibiotic resistance or adverse events.
A centuries-old herbal medicine, discovered by Chinese scientists and used to effectively treat malaria, has been found to potentially aid in the treatment of tuberculosis and may slow the evolution of drug resistance.
Johns Hopkins researchers have developed a computer simulation that helps predict under which circumstances a new short-course treatment regimen for drug-resistant tuberculosis could substantially reduce the global incidence and spread of the disease.
University of Rhode Island pharmacy professor has discovered potential complications when Hepatitis C and HIV drugs are used in combination with additional medications to combat co-infections.
An investigation by Southern Research biologists reveals for the first time that fatty acids known as oxylipins play a critical role in the formation of the biofilm shield that protects disease-causing bacteria from antibiotics.
Biochemist Gautam Dantas inspects what’s deposited on infant diapers for clues about antibiotic resistance.
On the occasion of the 9th European Antibiotic Awareness Day, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) is releasing its latest EU-wide data on antibiotic resistance and antibiotic consumption.
Supercomputer simulations at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory have played a key role in discovering a new class of drug candidates that hold promise to combat antibiotic resistance. In a study led by the University of Oklahoma with ORNL, the University of Tennessee and Saint Louis University, lab experiments were combined with supercomputer modeling to identify molecules that boost antibiotics’ effect on disease-causing bacteria.
Gene mutations that affect drug metabolism may explain higher hospitalization rates for some older adults taking multiple medications, according to researchers from Columbia University.
Two widely prescribed antibiotics — chloramphenicol and linezolid — may fight bacteria in a different way from what scientists and doctors thought for years, University of Illinois at Chicago researchers have found. Instead of indiscriminately stopping protein synthesis, the drugs put the brakes on the protein synthesis machinery only at specific locations in the gene.
The Latest in Cell Biology News
Young children who reside with adults who work on large industrial hog operations in rural North Carolina had a higher prevalence of antibiotic-resistant Staphylococcus aureus bacteria in their nasal passages than children who live with adults who live in the same community but do not work on such operations, a new study suggests.
Researchers at Columbia University Medical Center and the Data Science Institute at Columbia University have uncovered a potentially dangerous drug interaction using data science.
A new study from the University of Missouri in partnership with scientists in Africa has uncovered evidence that these supplements and their antioxidants may reduce the effectiveness of prescription medications. The researchers examined the effects of a widely used African botanical supplement, called Sutherlandia, and found that it may disrupt the effectiveness of a common anti-tuberculosis drug. This could lead to the development of active tuberculosis and perhaps drug resistant forms of the pathogen in some patients.
A team at the Rutgers has won a $300,000 contract with the CDC to investigate emergence of antifungal drug resistance by the common fungal pathogen Candida glabrata. Fungal infections are a leading cause of morbidity and mortality among individuals with compromised immune systems. Treatment options are already highly limited.
A new study offers compelling evidence that a novel form of the dangerous superbug Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) can spread to humans through consumption or handling of contaminated poultry. The research, published online today in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, shows that poultry may be an important source of human exposure to MRSA, a superbug which can cause serious infections and even death.
Scientists at The Scripps Research Institute have discovered a potential new weapon against Clostridium difficile, a bacterium that causes hundreds of thousands of severe intestinal infections in the U.S. every year and is frequently fatal.
This year, the U.S. reported for the first time that a patient had been infected by bacteria resistant to colistin, an antibiotic of last resort. The announcement followed several years of warnings that current antibiotics aren't diverse enough to fight pathogens as drug resistance spreads. The cover story of Chemical & Engineering News (C&EN), the weekly newsmagazine of the American Chemical Society, sums up how researchers are trying to stay ahead of the bugs.
New study results provide insight into a long-observed, but little-understood connection between chronic pain and anxiety and offer a potential target for treatment. Researchers found that increased expression of PACAP -- a peptide neurotransmitter the body releases in response to stress -- is also increased in response to neuropathic pain and contributes to these symptoms.
The National Institutes of Health has awarded Dr. Luis Martinez of New York Institute of Technology a $431,700 three-year grant to investigate, in mice, methamphetamine's effects on the underlying biological mechanisms that cause inflammation and impair wound healing. Martinez hopes his findings can form the foundation for new studies on human subjects that might lead to targeted prevention and wound management.
Whitehead Institute scientists have identified a potential antifungal mechanism that could enable combination therapy with fluconazole, one of today’s most commonly prescribed fungal infection treatments. Severe, invasive fungal infections have a mortality rate of 30-50% and cause an estimated 1.5 million deaths worldwide annually.
Australian researchers have made a world-first breakthrough in the early detection of patients' resistance to a common treatment for chronic myeloid leukemia.
Researchers have discovered a regulatory system in the ulcer- and stomach cancer-causing bacteria, Helicobacter pylori, that can control the formation of biofilm – a “fortress-like” cluster of cells that can become resistant to antibiotics and cause major medical problems.
Fungal infections pose a major threat to hospital patients and have proven difficult to combat, but scientists have unlocked evidence that could lead to more effective treatment.
The recent emergence of bacterial infections that are resistant to many existing antibiotics is driving an urgent need for tools to quickly identify the small number of therapies that are still effective for individual patients. Currently, multi-drug resistant bacteria often must be sent to specialized laboratories for analysis, leading to several days of delay before results can guide therapy. Now investigators at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) have developed a simple and versatile method using inkjet printing technology to test such bacteria for susceptibility to antibiotics in a clinical setting. The method, already available online, is described in the September issue of the Journal of Clinical Microbiology.
Boston’s subway system, known as the T, might be just as bacteria-laden as you’d expect but organisms found there are largely from normal human skin and incapable of causing disease, according to a study published June 28 in mSystems, an open access journal of the American Society for Microbiology.
University of California, Irvine scientists led by Emiliana Borrelli and colleagues have discovered the key cellular mechanism that underlies the antipsychotic-induced parkinsonism – which includes involuntary movements, tremors and other severe physical conditions. These studies present evidence that will stimulate a targeted approach for the design of novel antipsychotics without side-effects.
A collaboration between Rush University Medical Center and Cook County Health and Hospitals System, considered a national model for developing strategies to combat drug resistant bacteria, was awarded nearly $10 million by the CDC
Go here for the latest research, experts and features on Zika in the Zika Virus News Source
New research has discovered peptides from two crop species that have antimicrobial effects on bacteria implicated in food spoilage and food poisoning They are similar in structure to a human peptide used to guard against beer-spoiling bacteria
The University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center has joined a national network of scientists on the leading edge of drug discovery and development in the fight against cancer, centered at the Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research.
Once inside the human body, infectious microbes like Salmonella face a fluid situation. They live in a watery world, surrounded by liquid continually flowing over and abrading their cell surfaces--a property known as fluid shear.
Scientists from Columbia University’s Center for Radiological Research have shown that a narrow wavelength of ultraviolet light safely killed drug-resistant MRSA bacteria in mice, suggesting its potential to reduce surgical site infections.
Dr. Tim Anderson at Texas Biomedical Research Institute and Dr. Phil LoVerde at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio have been awarded a $3.5 million grant over the next five years by the National Institutes of Health to understand the genetic changes in the schistosome parasite that lead to drug resistance.
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