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Enzyme to arrest bacteria cell growth discovered
Why is it in news?
- Scientists at the Centre for Cellular & Molecular Biology (CCMB) have discovered a new enzyme which helps in breaking cell walls of bacteria.
- It, thus, offers a potential for a new drug delivery route to arrest the anti-bacterial resistance through existing antibiotic drugs.
More in news
- It is crucial to know how cells grow in bacteria to understand the anti-bacterial resistance to currently available antibiotics.
- Principal players: Scientists have been working on how the cell governs the synthetic machinery to build the cell wall in the first place, identified the principal players behind the process and discovered the new mechanism or enzyme through which the cell regulates growth of its wall.
- How Blocking function will help?:(1) Other bacteria, too, have the same enzyme working on cell division as the cell wall is fundamental for bacterial growth and division.(2) Therefore, by blocking this ‘scissors enzyme’ from functioning, new ways to target microbes could be found, leading to a new wave of antibiotic drugs.
- classical antibiotic drugs function: In contrast, the classical antibiotic drugs target the last stage of cell synthesis to prevent cell growth like penicillin that hits the machinery that creates the cell wall — a mesh-like structure of cross-linked sugars and peptides.
- New combination: The next step is to find out the molecule of the enzyme endo-pepcidine and it has to be followed by the drug trials to unravel a new combination of drugs to replace existing antibiotics.
Source
The Hindu