Why some TB cells resist antibiotics
A new study led by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers provides a novel explanation as to why some tuberculosis cells are inherently more difficult to treat with antibiotics. The discovery, which showed that the ways mycobacteria cells divide and grow determine their susceptibility to treatment with drugs, could lead to new avenues of drug development that better target tuberculosis cells. The study appears Dec. 15 in an online edition of Science. “We have found that the consequences of the simple and unexpected patterning of mycobacterial growth and division means some bacterial cells have the capacity to survive in the face of antibiotics,” said Bree Aldridge, a postdoctoral fellow at HSPH and co-first author of the study. Tuberculosis is an infectious disease that kills more than 1.5 million people annually. It is a difficult disease to treat; people are prescribed a combination of antibiotics to be taken daily for six to nine months, a...