Research news

"New opportunities for understanding the binding forces of antibiotics at the single molecule level and for exploring the architecture and assembly of bacterial cell walls"

Two ISV teams have succeeded in attaching antibiotics on AFM (Atomic Force Microscopy) tips for detecting their ligands on living bacteria.

The result of this work is now in press in Nano Letters and is entitled "Single-molecule force spectroscopy and imaging of the vancomycin/D-Ala-D-Ala interaction".

For the first time, vancomycin-modified tips were used to map individual vancomycin binding sites on living bacteria with unprecedented lateral resolution.  This work opens the door to new opportunities for understanding the binding forces of antibiotics at the single molecule level and for exploring the architecture and assembly of bacterial cell walls.

Yann Gilbert, Marie Deghorain, Ling Wang, Bing Xu, Philipp D. Pollheimer, Hermann J. Gruber, Jeff Errington, Bernard Hallet, Xavier Haulot, Claire Verbelen, Pascal Hols, and Yves F. Dufrêne*
Nano Lett.; 2007; (ASAP Web Release Date: 23-Feb-2007; (Letter) DOI: 10.1021/nl0700853)