Antibiotics kill bacteria and can be an effective treatment for bacterial diseas

Question

Antibiotics kill bacteria and can be an effective treatment for bacterial diseases. Antibiotic resistance is an evolutionary response by the bacteria to an antibiotic, where bacteria are able to survive and increase in the population if they possess a mutation such that the antibiotic is not effective. Then, the antibiotic is less successful against that population of bacteria. The British government has called antibiotic resistance a major national risk. In this article, Antibiotics Target Gene Expression, the Chief Scientific Officer of ProCarta BioSystems, Michael McArthur, discusses a new antibiotic targeting gene expression.

Link to article: http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/content/interviews/interview/1000153/

Answer the following four questions based on this article. Be sure to put your answers in your own words and number your answers.

[1 point] What type of molecule is their new antibiotic?

[1 point] What is the mechanism that the antibiotic uses to kill specific bacteria?

{1 point] What prevents the antibiotic from killing human cells?

[1 point] How did they describe how the antibiotic might enter the bacterial cell?

Explanation / Answer

1. the new molecule is oligonucleotide sequences.

2. these molecules have sequence complementary to the DNA sequence of certain genes whihc are responsible for making the bacteria pathogenic. Thus, inhibit their growth and infection.

3. using bioinformatics tools, the sequence of the oligonucleotides can be compared to that of human genome and thus, care can be taken that these oligontds will not bind or inhibit human gene expressions.

4. they are using liposomes nanoparticles which are fatty acid systems which contain hydrophilic center. these centers will contain the oligontds and thus, deliver it within the bacterial cells this uptake can be mediated by mimicking the outer surface of liposome nanoparticles similar to that of membranes thus, the bacteria can take up the liposome and drug will be released within the bacterial cells.

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