New research explains why it is difficult to treat Lyme
disease
Greg St.
Martin, Northeaster University
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.
“It hasn’t been entirely clear why
it’s difficult to treat the pathogen with antibiotics since there has been no
resistance reported for the causative agent of the disease,” explained
University Distinguished Professor Kim Lewis, who led the Northeastern research
team.
In other infections, Lewis’ lab has tracked the resistance to
antibiotic therapy to the presence of persister cells—which are drug-tolerant,
dormant variants of regular cells.
The researchers have also reported
two approaches—one of them quite promising—to eradicate Lyme disease, as well
as potentially other nasty infections.
Lewis and his colleagues presented
their findings in a paper published
online last
week in the journal Antimicrobial
Agents and Chemotherapy. He co- authored the paper with Northeastern
doctoral students Bijaya Sharma and Autumn Brown, both PhD’16; recent graduate
Nicole Matluck, S’15, who received her Bachelor of Science in Behavioral
Neuroscience; and Linden T. Hu, a professor of molecular biology and
microbiology at Tufts University.
The research was supported by
grants from the Lyme Research Alliance and the National Institutes
of Health.
Lyme disease affects 300,000
people annually in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, and is transmitted to people via bites from infected blacklegged
ticks.
If caught early, patients treated with antibiotics usually recover
quickly. However, about 10 to 20 percent of patients, particularly those
diagnosed later, who have received antibiotic treatment may have persistent and
recurring symptoms including ,
muscle pain, fatigue, and neurological problems. These patients are diagnosed
with Post- treatment Lyme Disease Syndrome.
In addition to identifying the
presence of these persister cells, Lewis’ team also presented two methods for
wiping out the infection—both of which were successful in lab tests. One
involved an anti- agent called Mitomycin C, which completely eradicated all
cultures of the bacterium in one fell swoop.
However, Lewis stressed that,
given Mitomycin C’s toxicity, it isn’t a recommended option for treating Lyme
disease, though his team’s findings are useful to helping to better understand
the disease.
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