Mouse muscle (nuclei stained blue) expresses monoclonal antibodies (green) that are protective against the bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa.AMI PATEL
US researchers have successfully delivered a monoclonal antibody against a severe bacterial infection using DNA—the first time such a platform has been used for a bacterial target. Mice injected with the genetic sequence for a monoclonal antibody survived inoculation with the life-threating, multidrug-resistant pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa, providing a proof-of-concept for a potentially cheaper and faster alternative to current monoclonal antibody treatments. The findings were published last month (September 21) in Nature Communications.
“It’s great to see that this kind of in vivo delivery can have a protective effect, in this case in the context of a bacterial infection,” says Mireia Pelegrin, an immunologist at the Institute of Molecular Genetics of Montpellier, France, who was not involved in the current research. Compared to previous attempts with ...
