
IBM Research produces staph-killing polymers that leave healthy cells alone  - suchitpuri
http://www.research.ibm.com/articles/nanomedicine.shtml
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jrockway
_In addition to the potential use for systemic delivery of drugs, scientists
suggest that additional applications for these polymers could include adding
them to every day personal and cleaning solutions._

Oh, good idea! Let's also put it in the drinking water and feed it to
livestock! Nothing like that has ever caused resistance problems in the past!

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DanBC
Has anything developed resistance to regular household bleach?

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sp332
Drinking bleach won't cure your staph infection though.

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DanBC
Yes, this is kind of the point I'm making, poorly.

Some things like anti biotics are misused and that's caused resistance.

But handwashing with certain microbicides doesn't create colonies of resistant
bacteria on our wrists (where the microbicide is diluted) because these
microbicides have a different action.

Thus, putting this polymer in all sorts of places is less likely to lead to
resistance problems.

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dakrisht
Great research from IBM here. Antibiotic resistance is a prevalent problem in
our society today, with doctors prescribing antibiotics to everyone for
everything (to no fault of their own - because of patient demand).

Nanotechnology combining with advanced materials will lead to a better
understanding of pathogens and ultimately how to eradicate them. These are
great steps towards solving many real and serious issues facing society today.
It's certainly refreshing to see different disciplines coming together to move
us forward.

These [polymers] are years away from clinical use, but this is a glimpse into
the not too distant future.

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ams6110
_doctors prescribing antibiotics to everyone for everything (to no fault of
their own - because of patient demand)_

This happened when resistance wasn't well understood. I don't think it happens
nearly as much now. I've had doctors tell me "antibiotics won't help what you
have, stay in bed and you should feel better in a few days"

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danmaz74
"that move quickly to target infected cells in the body": does it make sense
to write this when you talk about bacteria? It looks to me like the author
confused them with how viruses work: With bacteria you don't target "infected
cells", you target infectious agents, the bacteriums.

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smegel
I always wondered if there would ever be a post antibiotic mechanism to kill
bacteria/viruses, along the lines of nanobots perhaps. Nice to see progress is
being made in this regard...the human race may be depending on it!

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smackay
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacteriophage](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacteriophage)

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jrabone
This sounds like an excellent material to make central lines out of, given the
current rates (~5%) of infection by antibiotic resistant S. Aureus and
friends.

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Fomite
We're already making central lines out of antimicrobial materials, like ionic
silver.

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WasimBhai
Very rudimentary understanding of Cancer so if someone from a field is here
please do comment: can this technique also be used for destroying Cancerous
cells?

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venomsnake
Doubtful. That is the problem with cancer cells - they are indistinguishable
from others. I think the current bleeding edge in cancer research are ways to
disable the cell mechanism that turns off the immune system near the cells.

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Fede_V
The relationship between the immune system and cancer is incredibly
complicated. There is, however, some fascinating research dealing with using
pathogens that somehow preferentially infect cancer areas of the patient, to
stimulate the immune system in that area:

[http://stm.sciencemag.org/content/2/44/44ra57.abstract](http://stm.sciencemag.org/content/2/44/44ra57.abstract)
is a paper that talks about it. It's pretty neat!

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trumbitta2
Everything able to replace, as a cheap and therefore widely used biocide, this
guy:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isothiazolinone](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isothiazolinone)
which is responsible for my allergy and awful dermatitis, it is a good thing.

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DonGateley
What of the huge population and variety of bacteria that are symbiotic and in
some cases necessary for good health such as gut bacteria? How would this
technology target only bad bacteria? Is it so customizable that variants can
be generated for specific pathogen species?

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Grae
How long until we stop targeting bacterial cells and start targeting healthy
human cells? I'm surprised no one's commented yet about the weaponization
prospects for these polymers.

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ta_goomast
I'm baffled by how this is both high-tech and totally bonkers, being able to
produce a polymer specifically targeting specific harmful bacteria is quite an
achievement by itself but it is dwarfed by the ability of IBM to do away with
the laws of physics, making matter just disappear is an incredible feat.

I wonder if this polymer just turns invisble or if it cease to exist without
leaving any other compounds, residues or energy.

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troymc
They claim that it's "biodegradable." I don't know the details, but I'm
guessing the polymer breaks apart into smaller, benign pieces over time? I
wonder if that means they have to make it right before using it, and what,
exactly, triggers the breakdown.

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Eye_of_Mordor
> adding them to every day personal and cleaning solutions

... is the best way to breed resistance...

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JoeAltmaier
The polymer doesn't work in a way that resistance is likely or even possible.
They spill the bacterias guts. Its like getting resistance to head-blowed-off
- not going to happen.

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icegreentea
To be fair... the mechanism of penicillin when described for the lay person is
remarkably similar to the description that IBM provides.

"the polymer attaches to the bacteria's membrane and then facilitates
destabilization of the membrane" vs "act by inhibiting the synthesis of the
peptidoglycan layer of bacterial cell walls".

And the resistance isn't to getting your head blown off. That's thinking too
much in the box. It's more like being resistant to having a bullet shot at
your head, either by somehow becoming invisible to your assailant's vision,
wearing a sufficiently good helmet, or having your vital organs located
somewhere else.

While I agree that it seems much harder for bacteria to overcome this new
approach, it really isn't safe to say that it's not possible. We have no idea
about the microbial world. We barely know a fraction of the microbes that
swarm around us, we have no idea what defenses, mechanisms and quirks they
have that might provide a method of resistace.

And since this is a passive process (just some polymer floating around) that
somehow does not damage human cells, you can bet that there's someway to spoof
that.

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robotmagician
To be clear (from an undergraduate microbiologist), my thought process behind
the claim that IBM's polymer is less likely to promote resistance: Faster-
acting agents that cause immediate destruction are much harder to develop
resistance to because normal minor variation from mutations is much less
likely to produce anything that will save a cell from death. So even if a cell
produces a minor variation in its membrane protein it will likely still be
killed and the "resistance" gets no chance to develop.

For something like penicillin, the bacteria gets quite some time to die (it
inhibits synthesis!) and there are many different places in the peptidoglycan
synthesis pathway for the cell to develop a resistance.

Does that make sense?

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DonGateley
Indeed it does! Thank you.

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moocowduckquack
This is very very cool.

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DodgyEggplant
Nobel prize

