Researchers put potent staph killer to the test, hope for new drug treatment
(PhysOrg.com) -- Standard antibiotics, and even those reserved for the most defiant infections, are fighting an uphill battle against the evolutionary ingenuity of bacterial defenses. Staphylococci, and especially methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), is a particular scourge in hospitals, and is increasingly infecting people outside of health care settings. But a promising new MRSA killer a genetically engineered enzyme first created at Rockefeller is now being tested in human skin cells and will soon advance to trials in a new animal model, the minipig. The enzyme has been recently been shown to target and kill MRSA in mice with greater efficiency than the only approved topical treatment for such infections, a drug called mupirocin. Researchers say the work is steadily advancing through stages that could lead to the development of a frontline drug to fight MRSA, which costs hospitals billions of dollars a year.