Related papers: Optimal strategies for fighting persistent bugs
The aim of this paper is to study two models for a bacterial population subject to antibiotic treatments. It is known that some bacteria are sensitive to antibiotics. These bacteria are in a state called persistence and each bacterium can…
It has long been known that antibiotic treatment will not completely kill off a bacteria population. For many species a small fraction of bacteria is not sensitive to antibiotics. These bacteria are said to persist. Recently it has been…
Prolonged lag time can be induced by starvation contributing to the antibiotic tolerance of bacteria. We analyze the optimal lag time to survive and grow the iterative and stochastic application of antibiotics. A simple model shows that the…
Antimicrobial protocols - using substances such as antibiotics or disinfectants - remain the preferred option for preventing the spread of pathogenic bacteria. However, bacteria can develop mechanisms to reduce their antimicrobial…
Bacteria develop resistance to antibiotics through various mechanisms, with the specific mechanism depending on the drug-bacteria pair. It remains unclear, however, which resistance mechanism best supports favorable treatment outcomes,…
Humans, domestic animals, orchard crops, and ornamental plants are commonly treated with antibiotics in response to bacterial infection. By curing infectious individuals, antibiotic therapy might limit the spread of contagious disease among…
In natural environments, solid surfaces present both opportunities and challenges for bacteria. On one hand, they serve as platforms for biofilm formation, crucial for bacterial colonization and resilience in harsh conditions. On the other…
The emergence of the phenomenon known as ABR (anti-bacterial resistance), is the result of the gradual decrease in the efficacy of antibiotics and the increase in the cost of producing new antibiotics. Hence, alternative solutions to…
Bacterial resistance to antibiotic treatment is a huge concern: introduction of any new antibiotic is shortly followed by the emergence of resistant bacterial isolates in the clinic. This issue is compounded by a severe lack of new…
Ecology and evolution under changing environments are important in many subfields of biology with implications for medicine. Here, we explore an example: the consequences of fluctuating environments on the emergence of antibiotic…
Humans, domestic animals, orchard crops, and ornamental plants are commonly treated with antibiotics in response to bacterial infection. By curing infectious individuals, antibiotic therapy might limit the spread of contagious disease among…
The tolerance of bacterial populations to biocidal or antibiotic treatment has been well documented in both biofilm and planktonic settings. However, there is still very little known about the mechanisms that produce this tolerance.…
The intestinal microbiota plays important roles in digestion and resistance against entero-pathogens. As with other ecosystems, its species composition is resilient against small disturbances but strong perturbations such as antibiotics can…
We show that a bacteria and bacteriophage system with either a perfectly nested or a one-to-one infection network is permanent, a.k.a uniformly persistent, provided that bacteria that are superior competitors for nutrient devote the least…
The evolution of antimicrobial resistance can be strongly affected by variations of antimicrobial concentration. Here, we study the impact of periodic alternations of absence and presence of antimicrobial on resistance evolution in a…
In order to grow in any given environment, bacteria need to collect information about the medium composition and implement suitable growth strategies by adjusting their regulatory and metabolic degrees of freedom. In the standard sense,…
The skin microbiome plays an important role in the maintenance of a healthy skin. It is an ecosystem, composed of several species, competing for resources and interacting with the skin cells. Imbalance in the cutaneous microbiome, also…
There is a pressing need to better understand how microbial populations respond to antimicrobial drugs, and to find mechanisms to possibly eradicate antimicrobial-resistant cells. The inactivation of antimicrobials by resistant microbes can…
This work studies fundamental questions regarding the optimal design of antimicrobial treatment protocols, using standard pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic mathematical models. We consider the problem of designing an antimicrobial…
We point out that a simple and generic strategy to lower the risk for extinction consists in the developing a dormant stage in which the organism is unable to multiply but may die. The dormant organism is protected against the poisonous…