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SUMMARY:Optofluidic Tools to Study Antibiotic Resistance - Dr. Jehangir Ca
 ma\, Physics Department\, University of Cambridge
DTSTART:20170203T174500Z
DTEND:20170203T191000Z
UID:TALK68763@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Dr. Hernandez-Ainsa
DESCRIPTION:Antibiotic resistance is a major challenge for modern medicine
 . One of the first biochemical mechanisms discovered in multi-drug resista
 nce involved a decrease in drug permeation across the bacterial membrane. 
 Therefore\, the quantification of drug transport across the bacterial memb
 rane is critical. We present an optofluidic permeability assay which quant
 ifies the permeability coefficient of drugs crossing lipid membranes. We d
 econstruct the bacterial membrane and study drug transport across its vari
 ous components\, using lipid vesicles as model systems. The drug molecules
  are tracked directly by stimulating their autofluorescence in the ultravi
 olet. Lipid vesicles are mixed with the drug in a controlled manner in mic
 rochannels and viewed at various time points\; the increase in drug autofl
 uorescence intensity within the vesicles over time is used to calculate th
 e drug’s permeability. We show that changing the lipid composition of th
 e membrane can change drug permeability by an order of magnitude. We furth
 er show that incorporating the Escherichia coli outer membrane porin OmpF 
 in the vesicles significantly enhances the flux of the fluoroquinolone nor
 floxacin across the membrane\, demonstrating the importance of such membra
 ne porins in antibiotic transport. Finally\, we end with a glimpse of how 
 similar techniques can also be used to study drug uptake in bacteria on th
 e single cell level\, thus providing a new tool to identify bacteria toler
 ant to drugs on the basis of reduced antibiotic uptake.
LOCATION:Wolfson College\, Gatsby Room
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