Here is a reason we need to stop polluting our planet! Compound Found in the Ocean Kills Anthrax, MRSA Researchers have discovered a compound from a marine bacterium that had potent activity against Gram-positive bacteria, including Bacillus anthracis (anthrax) and methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), in in vitro studies. The compound -- named anthracimycin -- came from Streptomyces, a bacterium collected from sediments off of the California coast by a researcher in the lab of William Fenical, PhD, of Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif. "The antimicrobial spectrum of anthracimycin also includes Gram-positive genera such as staphylococci, enterococci, and streptococci, but it either lacked activity or was weakly active against the Gram-negative species tested," Fenical and colleagues wrote in the international edition of Angewandte Chemie. A literature search failed to uncover any other natural compounds with the same chemical structure as anthracimycin, and its mechanism of action remains unclear. "The real importance of this work is the fact that anthracimycin has a new and unique chemical structure," Fenical said in a statement. "The discovery of truly new antibiotic compounds is quite rare." -- Todd Neale
Posted on: Sat, 20 Jul 2013 13:33:18 +0000
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