Cargo red blood cells
"Surprise cells" will become a new weapon in the fight against antibiotic-resistant bacteria
Anna Novikovskaya, Naked Science
Polymyxin B is one of the few antibiotics to which bacteria have not yet developed resistance. However, doctors prescribe this remedy only as a last resort, because by destroying pathogenic bacteria, the antibiotic simultaneously leads to damage to the nervous system and greatly harms the kidneys.
But now, perhaps, scientists from McMaster University (Canada) will be able to neutralize the harmful effects of polymyxin B on the body thanks to its new "packaging". They used red blood cells— the red cells of our blood—to remove all the contents from them and leave only the outer membrane, fill them with medicine and inject them back into the bloodstream.
But how will the "surprise cells" find the bacteria they need? To do this, the researchers had to further modify the membrane of red blood cells by coating them with specific antibodies "targeted" at a specific type of pathogen. Having reached the goal, such an erythrocyte will have to stick to the surface of the bacterium and secrete an antibiotic.
Thanks to such an unusual "packaging", an antibiotic harmful to the body will no longer be able to harm our own cells, and the long life of red blood cells (about 120 days) will allow "surprise cells" to reach the target sooner or later and destroy it. In addition, being inside the erythrocyte, the antibiotic will not interact with immune cells, which will be able to consider it a dangerous toxin and decompose.
The process of turning an ordinary red blood cell into a "surprise cell"
In the future, scientists assure, the same system can be used to deliver potent drugs to hard-to-reach parts of our body, for example, to the brain, protected by a blood-brain barrier that does not pass dangerous toxins. This will allow patients suffering from, say, Alzheimer's disease to receive treatment faster.
The study was published in the journal ACS Infectious Diseases (Krivić et al., Erythro-PMBs: A Selective Polymyxin B Delivery System Using Antibody-Conjugated Hybrid Erythrocyte Liposomes).
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