Antibiotic-Eating Bug Unearthed in Soil: Newly Discovered Bacterium Degrades an Antibiotic Both to Protect Itself and Get Nutrition
Date: 18.12.2012
Now new research has uncovered another possible mechanism of antibiotic "resistance" in soil. Canadian and French scientists report on a soil bacterium that breaks down the common veterinary antibiotic, sulfamethazine, and uses it for growth.
This is the first report of a soil microorganism that degrades an antibiotic both to protect itself and get nutrition. The researchers subsequently cultured from the treated plots a new strain of Microbacterium, an actinomycete that uses sulfamethazine as a nitrogen and carbon source. Extremely common in soil, actinomycete bacteria are known to degrade a wide range of organic compounds. And now at least two other sulfanomide-degrading Microbacterium strains have been reported, Topp says: one from soil and another from a sewage treatment plant.
In particular, long-term exposure to antibiotics puts significant pressure on soil bacteria to evolve resistance, which they typically do by giving and receiving genes that let them detoxify drugs, or keep the compounds out of their cells.
