Researchers at the Blavatnik Institute of Harvard Medical School have opened a new window into how bacteria rapidly develop antibiotic resistance — a major global health threat responsible for an estimated 1.3 million deaths each year.
The new study, published on November 20 this year for Science, focus on plasmids — small, free-floating genetic elements inside bacteria. These plasmids dey act like independent agents, carrying genes (including those wey bring resistance) and sharing am freely between different bacteria. Na this “free transfer” dey make antibiotics lose power fast.
For years, scientists don suspect say plasmids dey compete inside the same bacterial cell, and that this competition fit shape how resistance develops. But nobody fit study am properly — until the team wey Michael Baym and Johan Paulsson head, crack the problem.
Their approach relied on two key techniques. First, they set up starting conditions that allowed each bacterium to carry an equal mix of two competing plasmids. Then, using microfluidic technology, they isolated single bacterial cells so they could closely observe the “battle” between plasmids without interference from external factors..
According to first author Fernando Rossine, the method reveal new rules about plasmid behaviour, their limits, and how these tiny agents dey push bacteria to evolve. Sen say these new insights fit help scientists craft treatments wey target plasmid evolution itself — essentially turning plasmids against themselves.
Rossine talk say the work give scientists “new tools to fight and prevent antibiotic resistance by weaponizing the intracellular competition between mobile genetic elements.” He also note say the findings shed light on how evolution dey happen at different, sometimes conflicting levels inside living organisms.
The research, partly funded by federal agencies, appears in the paper titled “Intracellular competition shapes plasmid population dynamics” with DOI: 10.1126/science.adx0665.
The global fight against antibiotic resistance has now gained fresh scientific ammunition — and the next breakthrough may lie in harnessing bacteria’s own internal rivals to turn the microbes against themselves.
