Seminars

Metals such as mercury, arsenic, copper and silver have been used in various forms as antimicrobials for certainly hundreds - if not thousands - of years. The discovery of antibiotics and new organic antimicrobial compounds during the twentieth century saw a general decline in the clinical use of antimicrobial metal compounds, possibly with the exception of silver for burns treatments. These “new” antibiotics and antimicrobials were regarded as generally being safer to the patient and more effective antimicrobials than the metal-based compounds they supplanted. However, increasing concerns about antibiotic and multidrug resistance (MDR) in emerging and re-emerging pathogens, and new, and rediscovered uses for antimicrobial metals have promoted a recent upsurge in interest in their use in both clinical and non-clinical products.

Metal ion resistance mechanisms have already been characterized in a wide range of bacteria, but how widespread are these resistances in emerging and re-emerging pathogens? This talk will examine the evidence for antimicrobial metal ion resistances in recent genome sequence data from emerging pathogens -suggesting that the resistance genes are already present in some of these organisms- and will address some of the possible consequences of resistance to antimicrobial metals in these bacteria.