1.
Antimicrob Agents Chemother
; 59(12): 7786-9, 2015 Dec.
Artigo
em Inglês
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-26349831
RESUMO
We determined the microbicidal activities of antibacterials against nonreplicating Mycobacterium smegmatis grown in a starvation-based Loebel model for persistence. Whereas most drugs lost their activity, fluoroquinolones retained lethal potency. Dose-response characterizations showed a paradoxical more-drug-kills-less Eagle effect. Pretreatment of cultures with chloramphenicol blocked the lethal action of the gyrase inhibitors. These results suggest that fluoroquinolones at low concentrations trigger a protein synthesis-dependent cell death pathway and shut off this suicide pathway at elevated concentrations.