Scientists from Trinity College Dublin have gained key structural insights into the machinery employed by opportunistic, disease-causing bacteria, which may help chemists design new drugs to inhibit them.
Scientists from Trinity College Dublin have gained key structural insights into the machinery employed by opportunistic, disease-causing bacteria, which may help chemists design new drugs to inhibit them.
The scientists, led by Fellow Emeritus in Trinity’s School of Biochemistry and Immunology, Professor Martin Caffrey, used next-gen X-ray crystallography techniques to ‘look under the bacterial bonnet’ and produce a molecular blueprint that may be used to design drugs that minimise off-target effects and attack any structural weaknesses.
The research, which shows that one key enzyme used in the common bacteria Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Escherichia coli is remarkably similar in structure in both species, has recently been published in leading international journal Nature Communications (DOI: 10.1038/ncomms15952).
These two bacteria opportunistically infect people, and can cause fatalities.
Read more at Trinity College Dublin
