Can Tiny Helpful Bacteria Help Us Fight Dangerous Bacteria?

Abstract

Antibiotics were a huge advance for the field of medicine because they decreased the risk of people getting sick due to harmful bacteria. However, bacteria quickly learned to “fight back” against these powerful medicines. Antibiotic-resistant bacteria, increasingly frequent nowadays, cannot be killed by antibiotics, making infections with these organisms very dangerous. Some common infections have become extremely difficult or even impossible to cure, leading to an alarming public health problem. In this article, we will discuss how helpful “predator bacteria” might be useful in fighting antibiotic-resistant infections. The bacterium we chose to study is called Bdellovibrio bacteriovorus, it lives in the healthy human gut and is capable of preying on other bacteria. In the future, might this bacterium be an effective treatment for dangerous bacterial infections? We think so!