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Biological Chemistry

Drug Delivery System May Treat Common Cattle Infection

ACS Meeting News: In preliminary tests, method kills bacteria behind liver abscesses that are typically left untreated

by Carmen Drahl
March 24, 2014 | A version of this story appeared in Volume 92, Issue 12

Ranchers may have cause to rejoice if a drug delivery system that works in cell cultures pans out in cattle. Researchers at Kansas State University have designed a treatment that they hope will eradicate liver abscesses caused by Fusobacterium necrophorum, a scourge that affects 12–32% of livestock. The microbe lives harmlessly in cows’ rumina, but aggressive feeding strategies push it into the liver, delaying the animals’ growth. What’s more, slaughterhouses must discard infected tissue, costing the beef industry an estimated $29.9 million in 2011 alone. Antibiotics effective against F. necrophorum can be toxic to healthy cells, so professor Stefan H. Bossmann, graduate student Sebastian O. Wendel, and colleagues searched for a cloaking strategy. They loaded the antibiotic chlorhexidine into Micrococcus luteus, a microbe frequently found on human teeth and skin. To target the abscesses, they inserted the modified microbes into neutrophil granulocytes, which are white blood cells that respond to inflammation and then undergo apoptosis. This cell death process also degrades M. luteus, releasing the antibiotic. In cell cultures, F. necrophorum did not survive the targeted treatment. The team next plans to test their strategy in rodents. Biological cloaking isn’t a new idea, but applying it to this case is smart, noted molecular release expert Catherine J. Murphy of the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. She looks forward to seeing results of animal studies.

Structure of chlorhexidine.

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