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PLEASE CITE MOLECULAR SYSTEMS BIOLOGY AND THE MOLECULAR SYSTEMS BIOLOGY WEBSITE AS THE SOURCE OF THE FOLLOWING ITEM. IF PUBLISHING ONLINE, PLEASE CARRY A HYPERLINK TO www.nature.com/msb/
Synthetic biologists design suicidal bacteria to fight infection
DOI: 10.1038/MSB.2011.55
An engineered bacterium that can sense and kill infection-causing Pseudomonas aeruginosa – one of the leading causes of hospital-acquired infections – is described online this week in Molecular Systems Biology. The bacteria were constructed using tools from the emerging field of “synthetic biology,” which aims to build complex living devices not found in nature.
P. aeruginosa can cause life-threatening infections of the respiratory and gastrointestinal tracts in critically-ill or immunosuppressed patients. The P. aeruginosa strains found in hospitals are often resistant to common antibiotics, making treatment of these infections clinically difficult. Reports also indicate that the prevalence of P. aeruginosa antibiotic resistance is increasing, highlighting the urgent need for new treatment methods.
In response to this challenge, Matthew Wook Chang, Chueh Loo Poh and colleagues developed a strain of Escherichia coli that could potentially be used to fight P. aeruginosa infections. These engineered bacteria can detect the presence of P. aeruginosa by intercepting signals that these pathogens naturally use to communicate with one another. When the engineered bacteria sense nearby P. aeruginosa, they produce a compound that is toxic to P. aeruginosa and then burst themselves open, spreading the toxin into the local environment.
Currently, the authors have shown that their engineered E. coli can effectively sense and kill P. aeruginosa growing in laboratory cultures. The researchers hope that this technology will lead to new methods for fighting troublesome infectious pathogens like P. aeruginosa.
Author contacts:
Chueh Loo Poh (Nanyang Technological University, Singapore)
Tel: +65 6514 1088; E-mail: [email protected]
Matthew Wook Chang (Nanyang Technological University, Singapore)
Tel: +65 6513 8063; E-mail: [email protected]
Editorial contacts:
Andrew Hufton (Molecular Systems Biology, Germany)
Tel: +49 6221 8891 103; E-mail: [email protected]
Thomas Lemberger (Molecular Systems Biology, Germany)
Tel: +49 6221 8891 404; E-mail: [email protected]
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