SSS 2009-03-19

（单词翻译）

This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute.

Imagine antibiotics² that would never lose their punch. New research focuses on drugs that bacteria simply can’t resist. Most antibiotics work by killing³ pathogens. The problem is, it’s hard to kill every single microbe. The rare ones that survive reproduce, often creating a population that’s antibiotic¹ resistant⁴.

But what if you could make a drug that renders bugs⁵ harmless, without actually killing them? In that scenario⁶, bacteria might not evolve resistance. And that’s what researchers showed in the March 9th issue of Nature Chemical Biology.

The key is communication. In well-trained armies, commanders bark orders, and soldiers signal each other to coordinate⁷ their positions. The same is true for a lot of infectious bacteria, which hold off mounting a full assault—complete with toxins—until there are enough of them around.

The scientists designed three different compounds that jammed cell-to-cell signaling in bacteria that cause food poisoning and cholera⁸. And they found that the bugs remained sensitive to drugs, even after 26 generations. They still need to confirm that the bugs that are silenced are in fact less deadly. If so, the new antibiotics would leave bacteria alive, but they’d basically be POWs. With no way to escape.

Thanks for the minute for Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin.