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Seaweed Antibiotics?

Posted by michael on from the nori-is-good-for-you dept.

Dan Gaffney writes "A new treatment for cholera and perhaps a new type of antibiotic medicine may emerge from compounds discovered in an Australian seaweed. University of New South Wales researchers have found that furanones - isolated from the seaweed Delisea pulchra - can prevent the bacteria that cause cholera from switching on their disease-causing mechanisms. Furanones don't kill such microbes but simply "jam" their ability to signal each other, meaning their use less likely to create the drug-resistance problems."

3 of 40 comments (clear)

  1. Drug Resistance by ld_hrothgar · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If the Doctors would stop handing out antibiotics like it were candy (and the people would take them correctly! No more "I feel better so I'll SAVE the last three doses" crap) we wouldn't have a drug resistance problem in the first place.

    1. Re:Drug Resistance by ld_hrothgar · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I worked for several years as the office manager for a Medical Transcription service, I have several friends that are Medical Doctors and my girlfriend is in pre-med. I've seen the antibiotics flow like water around here where more and more people get drug resistant bugs every year.

  2. Antibiotics by bloodredsun · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The discovery of a new type of antibiotics is always welcome. The overuse of the common goups such as cephalosporins, and penicillins have contributed to bacterial resistance with the resulting appearance of bacteria such as MRSA.
    It will be interesting to see how broad a spectrum these furanones will turn out to have or how well they are in combination with other drugs, as well as their pharmacokinetics and tolerance. This research looks positive but it's early days.
    One point though, the poster should state their involvement in the study and also that of Biosignal.