Researchers at Rutgers University have found an antibiotic produced by an unidentified species of Rhizobium soil bacteria in a tropical forest located in Los Tuxtlas, Mexico. This discovery will provide promising research to advance probiotics and other antibiotic compounds.
The new antibiotic, phazolicin, inhibits detrimental bacterial strains from getting into the root systems of bean plants. Their research was published in the journal Nature Communications. Utilizing bioinformatics, the scientists were able to postulate the presence of phazolicin and then confirmed it in the lab. After determining the atomic structure of the antibiotic, the research team demonstrated phazolicin is bound to, and targets, the ribosome. Researchers were also able to modify and control sensitivity to the antibiotic by adding mutations in ribosomes.