Bacteriophages can treat and prevent Pseudomonas aeruginosa lung infections.
Antibiotic-resistant bacteria threaten life worldwide. Although new antibiotics are scarce, the use of bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria, is rarely proposed as a means of offsetting this shortage. Doubt also remains widespread about the efficacy of phage therapy despite recent encouraging results. Using a bioluminescent Pseudomonas aeruginosa strain, we monitored and quantified the efficacy of a bacteriophage treatment in mice during acute lung infection. Bacteriophage treatment not only was effective in saving animals from lethal infection, but also was able to prevent lung infection when given 24 h before bacterial infection, thereby extending the potential use of bacteriophages as therapeutic agents to combat bacterial lung infection.
Debarbieux
Laurent
L
Molecular Biology of the Gene in Extremophiles Unit, Department of Microbiology, Institut Pasteur, 75724 Paris, France. laurent.debarbieux@pasteur.fr
Leduc
Dominique
D
Maura
Damien
D
Morello
Eric
E
Criscuolo
Alexis
A
Grossi
Olivier
O
Balloy
Viviane
V
Touqui
Lhousseine
L
D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D016207:Cytokines / Q000378:metabolism; D007249:Inflammation / Q000378:metabolism; D008163:Luminescent Measurements; D008171:Lung Diseases / Q000382:microbiology* / Q000517:prevention & control*; D008297:Male; D051379:Mice; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D011552:Pseudomonas Infections / Q000382:microbiology* / Q000517:prevention & control*; D017105:Pseudomonas Phages / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*; D011550:Pseudomonas aeruginosa / Q000821:virology*; D016019:Survival Analysis; D051598:Whole Body Imaging
D016207:Cytokines