"Overusing antibiotics drives bacteria to evolve resistance to infections, which means new drugs are a priority. Drug-resistant infections are a growing problem one known as "the silent pandemic". Superbugs are now thought to directly kill around one million people a year worldwide and contribute to the deaths of millions more. Those figures are predicted to continue to grow. The collaboration will spend 45m on six fields of research."
"He will be targeting AI at a tricky group of infections, called Gram-negative bacteria, that includes well known bugs such as E. coli and Klebsiella pneumoniae. These species have an extra outer layer they use to control what gets in and out of a bacterium. Gram-negative species can block antibiotics from getting in and rapidly pump out those that penetrate the bacterial defences making them tough to treat."
A UK collaboration between the Fleming Initiative and GSK will apply artificial intelligence to accelerate discovery of new antibiotics and approaches against fungal infections. The project allocates 45m across six research areas to address rising drug-resistant infections that now directly kill around one million people annually and contribute to many more deaths. The Imperial-led effort will focus on Gram-negative bacteria such as E. coli and Klebsiella, organisms with an outer layer that restricts antibiotic entry and expels penetrating drugs. Teams will test molecules with varied chemistries, record uptake and retention, and train AI on that data to predict compounds that persist inside these bacteria.
Read at www.bbc.com
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