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I have always been taught that antibiotic resistance came from bacterial mutation. Are you suggesting that this biofilm is contributing to this resistance as we

I have always been taught that antibiotic resistance came from bacterial mutation. Are you suggesting that this biofilm is contributing to this resistance as well or instead of mutation?

DoreenMichele 9y ago
My dad fought in WW2. He used to tell this story: First, invaders would toss a grenade into a room, stunning all occupants, then promptly rush in and capture them at gun point. Then people began creating a safety zone in the corner with sand bags. When the grenade hit the floor, you dive for cover. After it goes off, you stand up with your weapon, getting the upper hand on the soldiers entering the room. Then they began tossing the grenade without pulling the pin. People dove for cover and waited for the grenade to go off. Meanwhile, you promptly enter and now you have the jump on them. So then people would hear the grenade hit the floor and look to see if the pin had been pulled before deciding how to react. When antibiotics were introduced, the world announced the end of disease. Now, we have antibiotic resistant super bugs. Antibiotic resistance is an arms race. It is probably not one dimensional. If infectious process were one dimensional, then the initial prediction that antibiotics heralded the ended of disease should have been accurate. But the only thing I am trying to suggest is that studies exist and people who are interested can look them up for themselves, read them and draw their own conclusions. I am sick to death of trying to discuss what I think about such things. It is never a positive experience.
- epmaybe 9y ago
  Sorry that you haven't had a productive discussion with others regarding this. I just remembered that I have indeed heard about biofilms and their ability to prevent antibiotic activity. However, I have only heard about them in the context of secretions by specific kinda of bacteria (e.g. pseudomonas aeruginosa) that form this wall around foreign objects preventing the efficacy of antibiotics. It is why we have to change out certain catheters after a specified amount of time.
Fomite 9y ago
For your interest: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12195733 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12195733 Biofilms do a number of things - they can help promote between-organism signaling that can promote the upregulation of resistance, they can physically protect from antibiotic penetration (one of many resistance mechanisms), and they can potentially change the behavior of the bacteria itself, which will have impacts on the antibiotic's efficacy (for example, bacteriostatic antibiotics are less of a problem if bacteria aren't proliferating anyway).
arkades 9y ago
There are a few interesting mechanisms of bacterial resistance. They don’t carry anything with them but genetics, so it’s hard to say it’s Not “always ... mutation”, but the genetic pathways have some interesting variety. You can form bio films, you can form spores, you can have Cell Wall materials that are less target-able by Cell-wall-targeting abx, you can build your own enzymes to degrade abx, you can build pumps to actively pump abx back out of the Cell, you can trap the abx between your cell membrane and your cell wall so that your defensive enzymes have a much higher effective concentration, etc. That’s not even getting into the abx that target transcription and translation, rather than just Cell wall destroyers. I think the traditional mental model is “evolve a slightly different target molecule so abx can’t target them anymore,” which yeah, vastly understated the complexity.

I have always been taught that antibiotic resistance came from bacterial mutation. Are you suggesting that this biofilm is contributing to this resistance as well or instead of mutation?

DoreenMichele 9y ago

My dad fought in WW2. He used to tell this story: First, invaders would toss a grenade into a room, stunning all occupants, then promptly rush in and capture them at gun point. Then people began creating a safety zone in the corner with sand bags. When the grenade hit the floor, you dive for cover. After it goes off, you stand up with your weapon, getting the upper hand on the soldiers entering the room. Then they began tossing the grenade without pulling the pin. People dove for cover and waited for the grenade to go off. Meanwhile, you promptly enter and now you have the jump on them. So then people would hear the grenade hit the floor and look to see if the pin had been pulled before deciding how to react. When antibiotics were introduced, the world announced the end of disease. Now, we have antibiotic resistant super bugs. Antibiotic resistance is an arms race. It is probably not one dimensional. If infectious process were one dimensional, then the initial prediction that antibiotics heralded the ended of disease should have been accurate. But the only thing I am trying to suggest is that studies exist and people who are interested can look them up for themselves, read them and draw their own conclusions. I am sick to death of trying to discuss what I think about such things. It is never a positive experience.

epmaybe 9y ago
Sorry that you haven't had a productive discussion with others regarding this. I just remembered that I have indeed heard about biofilms and their ability to prevent antibiotic activity. However, I have only heard about them in the context of secretions by specific kinda of bacteria (e.g. pseudomonas aeruginosa) that form this wall around foreign objects preventing the efficacy of antibiotics. It is why we have to change out certain catheters after a specified amount of time.

Fomite 9y ago

For your interest: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12195733 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12195733 Biofilms do a number of things - they can help promote between-organism signaling that can promote the upregulation of resistance, they can physically protect from antibiotic penetration (one of many resistance mechanisms), and they can potentially change the behavior of the bacteria itself, which will have impacts on the antibiotic's efficacy (for example, bacteriostatic antibiotics are less of a problem if bacteria aren't proliferating anyway).

arkades 9y ago

There are a few interesting mechanisms of bacterial resistance. They don’t carry anything with them but genetics, so it’s hard to say it’s Not “always ... mutation”, but the genetic pathways have some interesting variety. You can form bio films, you can form spores, you can have Cell Wall materials that are less target-able by Cell-wall-targeting abx, you can build your own enzymes to degrade abx, you can build pumps to actively pump abx back out of the Cell, you can trap the abx between your cell membrane and your cell wall so that your defensive enzymes have a much higher effective concentration, etc. That’s not even getting into the abx that target transcription and translation, rather than just Cell wall destroyers. I think the traditional mental model is “evolve a slightly different target molecule so abx can’t target them anymore,” which yeah, vastly understated the complexity.