Boosting the Antibiotic Arsenal

1. Highlights • Quinolone antibiotics fail to kill bacterial populations at high density • Exhaustion of OXPHOS substrates drives bacterial persistence • Carbon and electron acceptor supplementation restores antibiotic activity • Metabolic priming of OXPHOS reverses tolerance in diverse bacterial species.  2.Sensitization to Cipro in Clinically Relevant Pathogens. 

MIT researchers have discovered a way to make bacteria more vulnerable to quinolones, which include ciprofloxacin and are often used to treat infections such as E coli and Staphylococcus aureus. The new strategy overcomes a key limitation of these drugs, which is that they often fail against infections that feature a very high density of bacteria...

Read More

Scientists observe Supermassive Black Hole in Infant Universe

Artist’s conceptions of the most-distant supermassive black hole ever discovered, which is part of a quasar from just 690 million years after the Big Bang. It is surrounded by neutral hydrogen, indicating that it is from the period called the epoch of reionization, when the universe's first light sources turned on. Image: Robin Dienel (Courtesy of the Carnegie Institution for Science)

Artist’s conceptions of the most-distant supermassive black hole ever discovered, which is part of a quasar from just 690 million years after the Big Bang. It is surrounded by neutral hydrogen, indicating that it is from the period called the epoch of reionization, when the universe’s first light sources turned on. Image: Robin Dienel (Courtesy of the Carnegie Institution for Science)

Findings present a puzzle as to how such a huge object could have grown so quickly. A team of astronomers, including two from MIT, has detected the most distant supermassive black hole ever observed. The black hole sits in the center of an ultrabright quasar, the light of which was emitted just 690 million years after the Big Bang...

Read More

Two Super-Earths around Red Dwarf K2-18

K2-18 system

searchers at the Centre for Planetary Sciences have found that K2-18b could very well be a scaled-up version of Earth. They also discovered it has a neighbour. (Illustration by Alex Boersma)

New ESO research has revealed that a little-known exoplanet called K2-18b could well be a scaled-up version of Earth. Just as exciting, the same researchers also discovered for the first time that the planet has a neighbor. “Being able to measure the mass and density of K2-18b was tremendous, but to discover a new exoplanet was lucky and equally exciting,” says lead author Ryan Cloutier, a PhD student in U of T Scarborough’s Centre for Planet Science, U of T’s Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, and Université de Montréal Institute for research on exoplanets (iREx).

Both planets orbit K2-18, a ...

Read More

Smartphone Case offers Blood Glucose Monitoring on the go

This custom-designed Android app displays test results on a smartphone screen. Credit: David Baillot/UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering

This custom-designed Android app displays test results on a smartphone screen. Credit: David Baillot/UC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering

Engineers at the UCSD have developed a smartphone case and app that could make it easier for patients to record and track their blood glucose readings, whether they’re at home or on the go. Currently, checking blood sugar levels can be a hassle for people with diabetes, especially when they have to pack their glucose monitoring kits around with them every time they leave the house.

“Integrating blood glucose sensing into a smartphone would eliminate the need for patients to carry a separate device,” said Patrick Mercier, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at UC San Diego...

Read More