New attack on antibiotic resistant bacteria

Drug discovery company, RiboTargets, in the UK, is mounting a fresh attack on bacteria that cause disease, especially on bacteria that have become resistant to the antibiotics used against them today.

The developments are based on discoveries concerning the structure of bacterial ribosomes and how to attack and disable these vital organelles. Since ribosomes are the location for the translation of DNA into new proteins, bacteria will soon die without properly functioning ribosomes.

Human as well as bacterial cells use ribosomes to produce proteins, but the structure of bacterial ribosomes is different from that of human ribosomes. As a result, some of the antibiotics attack bacterial ribosomes without harming human ribosomes.

Natural or synthetic antibiotics which work in this way could therefore be used to attack bacteria infecting humans without damaging human cells.

Antibiotics which block the works of bacterial ribosomes can be very effective, since each time one ribosome is brought to a halt as it moves along a messenger molecule, all the other ribosomes moving along the same molecule behind it also stop.

Thus the effect of one molecule of such an antibiotic is amplified many times over.

For further information, please visit RiboTargets