(Press-News.org) What: Scientists from the National Institutes of Health have discovered how catheter-related bacterial infection develops and disseminates to become a potentially life-threatening condition. The study, which included research on Staphylococcus epidermidis in mice implanted with catheters, could have important implications for understanding many types of bacterial biofilm infections, including those caused by methicillin-resistant S. aureus (MRSA).
Biofilms are clusters of microbes that almost always are found with healthcare-associated infections (HAIs) involving medical devices such as catheters, pacemakers and prosthetics. Most often biofilms that develop on such devices consist of Staph bacteria. Because biofilms inherently resist antibiotics and immune defenses, treating patients with biofilm-associated infections can be difficult and expensive. An estimated two million HAIs, most of which are associated with biofilms, occur in the United States annually, accounting for about 100,000 deaths.
Although biofilm-related infections result in significant numbers of deaths, scientists still have a limited understanding of how biofilms develop at a molecular level. But now scientists from NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) have identified a specific S. epidermidis protein, called phenol-soluble modulin beta (PSM-beta), that biofilms use for multiple purposes: to grow, to detach from an implanted medical device, and to disseminate infection. Antibodies against PSM-beta slowed bacterial spread within the study mice, suggesting that interfering with biofilm development could provide a way to stop the spread of biofilm-associated infection.
Similar proteins also are found in S. aureus, and the research group now plans to study their role in biofilms of MRSA and other bacteria.
INFORMATION:
Article: R Wang et al. Staphylococcus epidermidis surfactant peptides promote biofilm maturation and dissemination of biofilm-associated infection in mice. The Journal of Clinical Investigation 121(1): DOI: 10.1172/JCI42520 (2011).
Who: Michael Otto, Ph.D., senior investigator, Laboratory of Human Bacterial Pathogenesis, NIAID. Dr. Otto is an expert in biofilms and Staphylococcus bacteria.
Contact: To schedule interviews, please contact Ken Pekoc, 301-402-1663, kpekoc@niaid.nih.gov.
NIAID conducts and supports research—at NIH, throughout the United States, and worldwide—to study the causes of infectious and immune-mediated diseases, and to develop better means of preventing, diagnosing and treating these illnesses. News releases, fact sheets and other NIAID-related materials are available on the NIAID Web site at http://www.niaid.nih.gov.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH)—The Nation's Medical Research Agency—includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services. It is the primary federal agency for conducting and supporting basic, clinical and translational medical research, and it investigates the causes, treatments and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit http://www.nih.gov.
Madison, WI December 6 2010 -- An expansion of soybean production into areas where soybean has seldom, if ever, been grown can be problematic for some farmers. Soils having high pH values and large amounts of calcium and/or magnesium carbonate are notoriously iron deficient. Iron deficient soils in the North Central United States are estimated to reduce soy bean production by 12.5 million bushels every year.
John Wiersma, a researcher at the University of Minnesota Northwest Research and Outreach Center at Crookston, concluded a study examining the effect of nitrogen based ...
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – A new study finds that combining the newer diabetes drug exenatide with insulin provides better blood sugar control in patients with type 2 diabetes than insulin alone and helps promote weight loss.
"This study may be the best result ever for patients whose diabetes is inadequately controlled on a combination of pills and insulin," said John Buse, MD, PhD, lead author of the study and chief of the Division of Endocrinology and Metabolism in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine.
"Until now, it was inconceivable that you ...
(ORLANDO, Fla.) – A personalized vaccine is a powerful therapy to prevent recurrence among certain follicular lymphoma patients, according to the latest results of ongoing research led by the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. The new findings show that when these patients – whose tumors are marked by a specific protein that may be present in up to half of people with this type of cancer -- receive a vaccine made from their own tumor cells, disease-free survival is improved by nearly two years, compared with patients who receive a placebo. Based on the new analysis, ...
MADISON — Bacteria are among the simplest organisms in nature, but many of them can still talk to each other, using a chemical "language" that is critical to the process of infection. Sending and receiving chemical signals allows bacteria to mind their own business when they are scarce and vulnerable, and then mount an attack after they become numerous enough to overwhelm the host's immune system.
This system, called "quorum sensing," is an interesting example of sophistication among microbes, says Helen Blackwell, an associate professor of chemistry at the University ...
SEATTLE—Try to schedule your screening mammogram during the first week of your menstrual cycle. It might make breast cancer screening more accurate for pre-menopausal women who choose to have regular mammograms. This recommendation comes from an article published online December 3 in Radiology by Diana Miglioretti, PhD, a senior investigator at Group Health Research Institute.
Dr. Miglioretti and her co-authors are working on an issue at the heart of recent controversies about breast cancer screening mammograms. In November 2009, new recommendations—including that women ...
Bioengineers from the University of California, San Diego developed an explanation for why some types of neurons die sooner than others in the brains of people with Alzheimer's disease. These insights, published in the journal Nature Biotechnology on November 21, come from detailed models of brain energy metabolism developed in the Department of Bioengineering at the UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering.
The Alzheimer's insights demonstrate how fundamental insights on human metabolism can be gleaned from computer models that incorporate large genomic and proteomic ...
Reston, Va. — A study published in the December issue of The Journal of Nuclear Medicine identified positron emission tomography/computed tomography (PET/CT) scans as a potentially useful tool for predicting local recurrence in lung cancer patients treated with radiofrequency ablation (RFA). RFA, which uses localized thermal energy to kill cancer cells, is increasingly used as an alternative treatment for patients unable to undergo surgery or other therapies to treat lung cancer.
"This study reinforces the utility of 18F-FDG-PET imaging in cancer detection and follow-up ...
In conversation, we often imitate each other's speech style and may even change our accent to fit that of the person we're talking to. A recent study in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, suggests that imitating someone who speaks with a regional or foreign accent may actually help you understand them better.
"If people are talking to each other, they tend to sort of move their speech toward each other," says Patti Adank, of the University of Manchester, who cowrote the study with Peter Hagoort and Harold Bekkering from Radboud ...
In a few years, a sip of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot or Pinot Noir may include a taste of the "Show-Me" State. The state grape of Missouri – the Norton variety grown at many vineyards around the state – is resistant to powdery mildew, a fungal pathogen that affects winemaking grapes around the world. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri are working to identify valuable genes from the Norton grape for eventual transfer into other grapes to make them less susceptible to mildew, decrease fungicide use and increase world-wide grape production.
Walter Gassmann, ...
The American Physical Therapy Association (APTA) is pointing to a new study on low back pain in Medicare patients in its efforts to encourage the newly established Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation to promptly launch a demonstration project on direct access to physical therapist services that was recommended in the recent health reform law. The study, published in the journal Spine, showed Medicare patients who received physical therapy in the acute phase following an episode of low back pain were less likely to receive epidural steroid injections, lumbar surgery, ...
