Clues to New Antibiotic in Roach Brains

Cockroach brains may lead to a cure.You probably won't want to switch jobs with these guys: Researchers at the University of Nottingham, UK, ground up bits of cockroach brains and body parts of locusts, put the bug mash in a petri dish full of drug-resistant bacteria and went home for the night (surely they washed up first!). When they came back to work in the morning, the bug brains and body parts had killed nearly all of the bacteria, including harmful E.coli (the type that causes meningitis) and MRSA, the methicillin-resistant staph bacterium. Now the intrepid researchers have set to work trying to identify the powerful anti-bacterial agents. So far nine molecules appear to be responsible for the antimicrobial activity in locust tissue. They are still trying to work out details of the roach brains. Better them than us!

Read about the study in Science News.