Prof Ying Zhang Borrelia persisters – Interview and drug activity
Interview with Prof. Ying Zhang at the NorVect Conference 2015 Published on Sep 29, 2015 Prof Ying Zhang from John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health explains why Lyme disease is so difficult to treat. Having worked with Tuberculosis (TB) for many years, he sees the similarities and differences between these to bacteria. With Tuberculosis it is known that you have to treat with certain drug combinations that kill the growing form and the non-growing form (persisters) and if you treat shorter than 6 months, the patient will get a relapse. The bacterium that causes Lyme disease is much more advanced than the TB bacterium, and the main reason is that it also takes a persisting form. These persister forms of the Borrelia bacteria cannot be cultured. The two views – ILADS and IDSA are two different ways of seeing the same disease. Prof. Zhang thinks they are both right. When it comes to acute Lyme disease, IDSA is right. Then you only need shorter courses of treatment. When the disease turns chronic, longer courses of treatment with the right drug combinations are needed (ILADS view). The full presentation from Dr Zhang is available on the Norvect website from their 2015 conference http://norvect.no/about-norvect/ Identification of novel activity against Borrelia burgdorferi persisters using an FDA approved drug library Jie Feng, Ting Wang, Wanliang Shi, Shuo Zhang, David Sullivan, Paul G Auwaerter and Ying Zhang Published online 2 July 2014 from abstract – ‘We identified 165 agents approved for use in other disease conditions that had more activity than doxycycline and amoxicillin against B. burgdorferi persisters. The top 27 drug candidates from the 165 hits were confirmed to have higher anti-persister activity than the current frontline antibiotics....Prof Kim Lewis – Persister Borrelia
The Paradox of Chronic Infections – Kim Lewis What processes take place in a bacteria population under antibiotic treatment? What important discovery made during World War II was forgotten? How can we circumvent the protection mechanisms used by bacteria populations? Professor of Biology at Northeastern University Kim Lewis explains the significance of a rediscovered phenomenon. Northeastern University researchers have found that the bacterium that causes Lyme disease forms dormant persister cells, which are known to evade antibiotics. This significant finding, they said, could help explain why it’s so difficult to treat the infection in some patients. Researchers’ discovery may explain difficulty in treating Lyme disease – “This is the first time, we think, that pulse-dosing has been published as a method for eradicating the population of a pathogen with antibiotics that don’t kill dormant cells,” Lewis said. “The trick to doing this is to allow the dormant cells to wake up.” He added: “This gives you an idea that you could, in principle, establish a similar regiment for treating patients for this and other chronic diseases.” http://www.northeastern.edu/news/2015/06/researchers-discovery-may-explain-difficulty-in-treating-lyme-disease/ Borrelia burgdorferi, the causative agent of Lyme disease, forms drug-tolerant persister cells. Bijaya Sharma, Autumn V. Brown, Nicole E. Matluck, Linden T. Hu and Kim Lewis —————————————————– Other videos of Prof Lewis Principles of Antibiotic Discovery – Kim Lewis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=89MdHzNHGZI&list=UUComKOHir2WrDuRZXP8DT-A Uncultured Bacteria – Kim Lewis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ojRvlwanSA What lights my fire https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBZ9hyrMsoM Prof Lewis team at Northeastern were recently in the news for their discovery of a new antibiotic Teixobactin http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25561178 Prof Lewis featured in a BBC documentary on Panorama on his research into finding new antibiotics http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-32701896 and earlier http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-30657486 ...Welcome
A warm welcome to Vis-à-Vis Symposiums We are a small charity focusing on the welfare of patients whose lives have been decimated, courtesy of a Tick. A parasite so invasive, capable of destroying and reducing formerly active healthy humans, and their companion animals, to lives of complete devastation and a miserable existence. A quote from a patient, and echoed by thousands of others globally; “ Lyme won’t kill you………… but there are days when you wish it would” Correction: in extreme cases Tick-borne diseases will kill you, hence the need for you to know about them. Our first symposium was held in June 2014, and was funded by a patient and organized by a group of patients and dedicated tick-borne disease specialists. We joined forces with the aim of bringing doctors, veterinarians, and researchers together in a united effort to tackle the dilemma of ill- health caused by the many tick-borne infections that are increasing at an alarming rate throughout the world. The event was so successful and generated so much goodwill and interest that it was obvious we should keep the momentum, and so here we are, ready to join forces again. Please, let us work in a united effort to combat these insidious and destructive infections before more lives are left unnecessarily in...
