The spread of drug-resistant "superbugs" — including bacteria that have evolved to thwart even the most potent antibiotics — represents an ever-growing threat to public health. Now, scientists have invented a new type of antibiotic that can take down these germs by rapidly rearranging its atoms and thus changing its shape.
The researchers described the first of these shape-shifting antibiotics in a paper published April 3 in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. So far, they've tested the shape-shifter in wax moth (Galleria mellonella) larvae, a common animal model used to test antibiotics' effectiveness, but they've yet to give the drug to humans or other mammals.
