A NEW NATURAL ANTIBIOTIC: TEIXOBACTIN

Abstract

Antibiotic resistance is spreading faster than the introduction of new antimicrobials into clinical practice, causing a public health crisis. Most antibiotics were produced by screening soil microorganisms. This limited resource of cultivable bacteria was overmined by the 1960s. It is reported that uncultured bacteria by in vitro conditions make up approximately 99% of all species in external environments, and are a source of new antibiotics which could not be explored yet. The new technology for growing uncultured organisms by cultivation in situ or by using specific growth factors have been developed. As a result, it is reported that a new antibiotic termed as teixobactin has been discovered in the screening of the new soil bacterium named as Eleftheria terrae. Teixobactin has bactericidal effects in Gram-positive bacteria inhibiting cell wall synthesis by binding to lipid II which is a a highly conserved precursor of peptidoglycan and lipid III which is a precursor of cell wall teichoic acid. It has been tested in two animal infection models: blood infections of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus and lung infections of Streptococcus pneumoniae. As a result, all animals were treated successfully and none developed resistance. If teixobactin is approved, it will be the first of a new class of antibiotics.