Scripps Research study reveals new approach for combating resting bacteria Blocking long phosphate molecules could eventually help treat chronic infections in which slow-growing bacteria evade typical antibiotics.
April 11, 2024
LA JOLLA, CA Most disease-causing bacteria are known for their speed: In mere minutes, they can double their population, quickly making a person sick. But just as dangerous as this rapid growth can be a bacterium's resting state, which helps the pathogen evade antibiotics and contributes to severe chronic infections in the lungs and blood, within wounds, and on the surfaces of medical devices.
Now, Scripps Research scientists have discovered how long chains of molecules called polyphosphates (polyP) are needed for bacteria to slow down movements within cells and let them enter this resting state. The findings, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on April 02, 2024, could eventually lead to new ways of treating chronic infections in which typical antibiotics aren't effective.
Many current antibiotics block bacterial growth, but bacteria spend a lot of their time not growing, says Lisa Racki, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Integrative Structural and Computational Biology at Scripps Research and senior author of the new paper. We really need new and creative strategies for targeting bacteria's slow-growing and non-growing phases.
Researchers have long known that bacteria can survive for especially long periods of time when they stop growing, entering a dormant and energy-saving state. They also knew that when bacteria enter this resting state, they use valuable energy to produce polyP strands, which form large clumps inside their cells. But scientists had been historically unsure about the purpose of polyP.
To study polyP, Racki and her collaborators turned to Pseudomonas aeruginosa, bacteria that can cause pneumonia and blood infections in people who are hospitalized or have weakened immune systems. One of the reasons P. aeruginosa can be so hard to treat is that it forms biofilms tightly joined, slimy communities of bacteria, many of which are in a resting state and can evade typical antibiotics.
When P. aeruginosa is starved of nitrogen one of the key nutrients it needs for growth it produces lots of polyP. In the new work, Racki and her collaborators at EPFL and Caltech discovered that a mutant unable to make polyP cannot enter its resting state. To better understand why this happens and the consequences, the researchers genetically engineered P. aeruginosa to make small, labeled particles that let them track how molecules within the bacteria were moving around.
What we found is that when you get rid of polyP, everything in the cell moves too much, says Racki. The cells are partying when they should be taking a break.
When starved of most nutrients, P. aeruginosa slows the movement of materials within its interior and stops dividing. But without nitrogen and polyP, the bacteria keep moving materials around at top-speed, become bigger, loosen their genetic material and continue dividing.
Racki's team concluded that polyP is usually responsible for helping P. aeruginosa and likely other bacterial species slow down. It also leads them to hypothesize that preventing cells from producing polyP could keep them active and make them more susceptible to some antibiotics.
This not only helps point in possible directions for treating pathogenic bacteria, but also reveals answers for fundamental questions about how things diffuse throughout a bacterial cell, says Racki.
Racki and her lab are now planning more experiments to better probe exactly why cells cannot slow their interior movements without polyP, and whether blocking the bacterial production of polyP could be an effective tactic to treat some infections.
In addition to Racki, authors of the study, Polyphosphate affects cytoplasmic and chromosomal dynamics in nitrogen-starved Pseudomonas aeruginosa , are Sofia Magkiriadou, Willi Leopold Stepp and Suliana Manley of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL); and Dianne Newman of Caltech.
This work was supported by funding from the National Institutes of Health (DP2-GM- 784-140918), the European Research Council (ERC CoG 819823), the Swiss National Science Foundation (182429), and the Donald E. and Delia B. Baxter Foundation Fellowship.
Infectious Diseases Racki, Lisa
North America Stories
22/10/2025
Prime Video Inks Deal To Present NFL Black Friday Game Worldwide By SVG Staff
Wednesday, October 22, 2025 - 10:06 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story ...
22/10/2025
NBA Tip-Off: ESPN Goes 1080p HDR End-to-End, Flipping HDR Switch on REMI and REM...
22/10/2025
FloSports Empowers Division II, III Athletic Departments With Turnkey Production...
22/10/2025
Wall Street Video Summit Debuts, Bringing Together 200 Financial Enterprise Vide...
22/10/2025
Dueling Pianos: International Chopin Piano Competition Is as Competitive as a Ba...
22/10/2025
The Orion spacecraft for NASA's Artemis II mission is stacked on the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket in High Bay 3 of the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kenn...
22/10/2025
L3Harris' Hybrid SATCOM is resilient by design, offering path diversity that eliminates vulnerabilities by routing data across the best available networks i...
22/10/2025
WASHINGTON, D.C. Organizers of NAB Show New York said they are expecting more than 12,000 registered attendees from about 100 countries along with 260 exhibitor...
22/10/2025
WASHINGTON, D.C The organizers of The 2025 NAB Show New York have announced that they are expecting more than 12,000 registered attendees from about 100 countr...
22/10/2025
Masque Sound, a leading theatrical sound reinforcement, installation and design company, supplied an extensive gear package of professional-grade equipment for ...
22/10/2025
Lightware, a global leader in signal management and AV connectivity solutions, is seeing strong market momentum for the UCX-3x3-TPX-RX20, a compact transmitter-...
22/10/2025
MELVILLE, N.Y. Chyron has released PAINT 10.2, the latest update for its telestration platform, adding support for SMPTE ST 2110 IP workflows, expanding brandin...
22/10/2025
WASHINGTON Run3TV today said NBCUniversal is joining as an investor in the ATSC 3.0 Framework Authority, which develops the Run3TV NextGen TV application platfo...
22/10/2025
ATLANTA swXtch.io will feature two new networking solutions extending the company's reach across more cloud and on-prem workflows at NAB Show New York, set ...
22/10/2025
The Warner Bros. Discoverys HBO Max streaming services has increased prices for all its streaming tiers effectively immediately for new customers. Existing cust...
22/10/2025
LOS ANGELES OpenDrives has signed a new distribution partnership deal with Versatile Distribution Services (VDS) to strengthen its channel and streamline how it...
22/10/2025
WASHINGTON, D.C The organizers of The 2025 NAB Show New York have announced that they are expecting more than 12,000 registered attendees from about 100 countr...
22/10/2025
Samora Pinderhughes Brings Immersive Sound to Berklee's Signature Series The artist and composer, who's worked with Herbie Hancock, Robert Glasper, Co...
22/10/2025
BMI Day at Berklee Celebrates Composer Fil Eisler and Awards Scholarship to Stud...
22/10/2025
October 22nd, 2025 TRIBECA ANNOUNCES STAR-STUDDED LINEUP OF MEMBERSHIP EVENTS F...
22/10/2025
European Broadcaster Upgrades To Grass Valley's NativeIP LDX 135 Cameras And...
21/10/2025
NAB New York 2025: Although AES Show Is on Its Own, Audio Will Be a Major Part o...
21/10/2025
NAB New York 2025: Business of Broadcast and Media,' Future of Content'...
21/10/2025
SVG All-Stars: Ethan Folz, Senior Director, Digital Operations and Quality of Ex...
21/10/2025
NBA on NBC/Peacock: Livestream Offers Graphic Overlays, Predictive Gaming, Ancil...
21/10/2025
NBA on NBC/Peacock: At the Front Bench With Producer Frank DiGraci and Director ...
21/10/2025
NBA on NBC/Peacock: NBC Sports, NEP Build Ultra-Flexible Production Plan That Se...
21/10/2025
Indigenous storytelling has been at the heart of the work of the Sundance Instit...
21/10/2025
Top L-R: Mysterious Skin, American Dream Second Row L-R: Little Miss Sunshine, D...
21/10/2025
Critical Design Review completion is a key milestone on the path toward Wideband Global Satellite Communications certification for the network in 2026, opening ...
21/10/2025
New Australian undersea training range to implement and improve warfighting tactics, proficiency and safety; enable joint/allied training that contributes to pr...
21/10/2025
September, the beginning of autumn, brought an expected revival to the TV market, largely due to the new fall TV schedules. The time spent in front of the TV sc...
21/10/2025
Broadcast Booms with 20% Uptick vs. August, Achieving Largest Monthly
Increase ...
21/10/2025
During September, streaming's share of TV viewing in Mexico settled at 24.5%, a marginal shift of -0.5 share points from the previous month.
Disclaimer: YU...
21/10/2025
RENNES, France BBright and GlobalM have conducted a technical trial validating Ultra HD interoperability across the entire contribution chain in the cloud, achi...
21/10/2025
Kokusai Denki Electric America will mark the U.S. debut of a new 4K camera at the 2025 NAB New York, Oct. 22-23. Now available, the Z-HD6500-S1 UHD/HD productio...
21/10/2025
Triveni Digital, a trusted leader in ATSC 1.0 and 3.0 service delivery, data broadcasting, and quality assurance solutions, will showcase its entire NEXTGEN TV ...
21/10/2025
Radio Azzurra FM, longest-running radio station in the province of Novara, northwest Italy, has invested in an DHD SX2 audio routing and mixing console for inte...
21/10/2025
Globecast, the leading provider of broadcast, media and entertainment managed services, has announced the appointment of G Morgan as Executive Vice President of...
21/10/2025
Visual Data announces the appointment of Maz Al-Jumaili as Senior Vice President, Worldwide Localization, to advance client engagement, strategic partnerships, ...
21/10/2025
As Amazon's Prime Video prepares to launch its coverage of NBA basketball under a major new deal, Grup Mediapro has announced that it is working with the st...
21/10/2025
ATLANTA Good news for consumers using an Atlanta DTH receiver to watch ATSC 3.0: with a new software update, they will be able to blanket their homes with Wi-Fi...
21/10/2025
While recent news has been heavily focused on Hispanic migration into the U.S., The 2025 Hispanic Market Report from Claritas highlights the fact that this gr...
21/10/2025
MAIDENHEAD, UK RWS has hired Michael Wayne as its head of media and entertainment in Los Angeles where he will lead the company's media localization busines...
21/10/2025
Imagine Communications and Rohde & Schwarz today announced a definitive agreement under which Imagine will acquire Pixel Power Limited, a wholly owned subsidiar...
21/10/2025
Atlanta DTH (ADTH) today announced a major update that will expand the functionality of its NEXTGEN TV receiver by enabling gateway capabilities allowing viewer...
21/10/2025
Heartland Video Systems, Inc. (HVS), a premier video systems integration, consulting, and expert ATSC 3.0 implementation firm announces that it has partnered wi...
21/10/2025
QuickLink, the leading provider of award-winning video production and remote guest integration solutions, today announced the appointment of Austin Hinton as it...
21/10/2025
nternet connectivity startup Miri Technologies Inc. will use this week's NAB Show New York as the launch pad for its latest ground-breaking innovation, the ...
Scripps Research study reveals new approach for combating resting bacteria Blocking long phosphate molecules could eventually help treat chronic infections in which slow-growing bacteria evade typical antibiotics. 
