Rudro
Evolution is something that takes thousands, even millions before it actually become noticeable. Though that may be case of us, of big living beings. But these evolutions occur at much more rapid rate among the microbes, such as bacteria, viruses etc. Yep, those tiny little things that causes infections and diseases. Over the time they can become resistant to our commonly used drugs and anti-biotic. That is scary, right? That being the case, scientists are always working in developing new resistive form of drugs against thosegrowing and evolving threats.
One of these drug-resistant super-bacteria is methicillin-resistantStaphylococcus aureusor staph infections, commonly grows in hospital settings. Better known as MRSA, and its evolved fangs are rapidly spreading everywhere. It can quickly spread from a superficialskin infection to an invasive life-threatening cancerous one.The Centres for Disease Control (CDC), 11,000 people died from MRSA complicationsamong 80,000 diagnosed, last year. Unfortunately, the treatments and anti-biotic we had, was not working against it anymore, until this new discovery.
A research team of University of Alabama, Birmingham, USA was one of the groups in recent Antarctica expedition. They were in this voyage for over years to find new compounds of curing diseases and infections. They found this new compound named ‘Darwinolide’inside an Antarctic sponge, Dendrillamembranosa. Astonishingly, the lab experiments have shown that on contact with the bacteria, it killed average of98.4% of MRSA cells. (That is even more huge than Lifeboy soap killing 99.9% germs advertisement.)Not only this, they also published in their journal in ‘Organic Letters’about their findings about other compounds. One that is discovered from a algae a fights the H1N1 strain of the flu virus. Another that might one can cure melanoma skin cancer.
Biologists suggest, Antarctica itself has a very harsh weather and extreme condition for life to develop. That is why, for survival adaptation the lifeforms (especiallytiny organisms) are forced to come up with some unique ways to survive in thebacteria-laden water they live in. .
That hones some extraordinary potent defense mechanisms, such as toxic compounds.One of the researchers, James McClintock said, “[Darwinolide] It’sdefensive compound against microbes with some very interesting properties.Sponges aren’t protected by shells and they can’t move around. When you’re that leaky, you have a constant battle on your hands.”Theirnext step is to synthesizeDarwinolide in the lab to artificially create more for production of treatments. That way, they won’t have to rely on extracting it from live Antarctic sponges every time it is needed.