Abstract
A significant portion of hospital-acquired infections throughout the world have been attributed to the antibiotic-resistant ESKAPE pathogens (Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella pnuemoniae, Acinetobacter baumanii, Psuedomonas putida, and various Enterobacter species). Various laboratories and collaborations have researched and developed new methods in an attempt to discover new antibiotics that can be utilized effectively in the treatment of infections caused by antibiotic-resistant ESKAPE pathogens. Streptomyces bacteria alone have produced an overwhelming two-thirds of the antibiotics available to the world today, and after analysis of various Streptomyces genomes, studies have shown that many Streptomyces still have unrealized potential for new antibiotics. We recreated anew method of co-culturing, utilized by previous studies, to induce an increase in the inhibitory range of Streptomyces antibiotic producers by growing different Streptomyces species, collected by Tiny Earth student researchers at California State University, Sacramento, together with the mycolic-acid-containing bacteria Mycobacterium smegmatis, then testing for inhibitory activity against safe ESKAPE relatives. However, we did not find a significant difference between the inhibition range of our controls and the inhibition range of our co-cultures. Our results suggest that co-culturing Streptomyces species and M. smegmatis is not effective for inducing an increase in inhibition range, but we plan to further explore this method using other mycolic-acid-containing bacteria in place of M.smegmatis.