mcr-9 gene’s protein structure/
Ahmed Gaballa, Cornell University
From ScienceDaily:
While sifting through the bacterial genome of salmonella, Cornell University food scientists discovered mcr-9, a new stealthy, jumping gene so diabolical and robust that it resists one of the world’s few last-resort antibiotics.
Doctors deploy the antibiotic colistin when all other infection-fighting options are exhausted. But resistance to colistin has emerged around the globe, threatening its efficacy…
Mcr-9 is the latest in this new series of “mobilized colistin-resistance” genes — originally discovered in 2015. The National Center for Biotechnology Information, part of the National Institutes of Health, has added details about this new gene to its database. Medical professionals and others can now use this information to identify mcr-9 in bacteria isolated from food products and people…
“If you go to a hospital and this gene is floating around, that can be trouble. The gene is moveable. It jumps,” Wiedmann said. “In a hospital setting, being able to screen a patient for resistance allows doctors and nurses to isolate the patient and maintain biosecurity.” Paper. (open access) – Laura M. Carroll, Ahmed Gaballa, Claudia Guldimann, Genevieve Sullivan, Lory O. Henderson, Martin Wiedmann. Identification of Novel Mobilized Colistin Resistance Gene mcr-9 in a Multidrug-Resistant, Colistin-Susceptible Salmonella enterica Serotype Typhimurium Isolate. mBio, 2019; 10 (3) DOI: 10.1128/mBio.00853-19 More.
Although they are using the term “jumping genes,” it sounds more like horizontal gene transfer, but we won’t quibble. Maybe the term “jumping gene” (which used to mean moving around within a single genome) will come to mean moving between organisms (horizontal gene transfer) as well.
Popular media are getting the picture about the risk:
We’ll give you the bad news first: mcr-9 is highly mobile, per the study. Bacteria can swap genetic information into their DNA, and the readiness with which mcr-9 is transferable means that this antibiotic resistance could rapidly proliferate, rendering existing treatments all-but-useless.Dan Robitzski, “Sneaky bacteria can swap genes, making them immune to antibiotics” at Futurism
Does anyone remember when antibiotic resistance was proof of Darwinism? Antibiotic resistance was Evolution. And Evolution was not non-Darwinian stuff like horizontal gene transfer/jumping genes. Welcome to post-Darwin science.
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See also: Horizontal gene transfer: Sorry, Darwin, it’s not your evolution any more
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