Sea sponge could become weapon in fight against deadly infections

FORT LAUDERDALE, FLA. — The solution to a vexing — and deadly — problem for modern medicine could be lying on the ocean floor.

Just like some insects have evolved to resist synthetic chemical insecticides, new infectious diseases have emerged over the last 20 years that can’t be controlled by the antibiotics doctors have at their disposal.

It could be sea sponges to the rescue, say a team of scientists, including some from Florida Atlantic University.

In a study published in the journal Frontiers in Micro- biology in April, research- ers identified several chemical compounds produced by microbes that live in deep-sea sponges. These secretions show promise in defeating antibiotic-resistant infections such as Methicil- lin-resistant Staphylococcus United States, the Caribbean, aureus (MRSA) and colostridEurope and Africa. Studyium difficile (C.diff ), which ing these sponges, scientists menace patients in hospi- have identified about 19,000 tals and long-term nursing microorganisms that live in facilities and cause numer- these sponges. ous deaths every year. As part of the sponges’

“There is this desperate natural defense against need to find new antibiot- other organisms invading ics,” said Peter McCarthy, a their space, these microbes marine microbiology profes- produce compounds that sor at Harbor Branch Oceankeep the invaders away and ographic Institute, part of the sponges thriving undersea. FAU campus in Fort Pierce. They’ve been testing how “We have picked up many chemicals in the microbes sponges that have never been that keep the sponges healthy seen before. So that led us react against the antibiotto believe they contained ic-resistant diseases that microbes that had never threaten mankind. been seen before.” “There is so much diver

The Centers for Disease sity and so much compeControl and Prevention puts tition down there. These C.diff at the most urgent level microbes are creating the of threat. MRSA is catego- anti-bacterial compounds,“rized as a “serious” threat. said McCarthy, who is work

The lab at Harbor Branch ing with researchers at the has sponge samples collected University of South Florida, over the past 30 years from the University of Kentucky as deep as 3,000 feet under and the Central South Unithe sea off the coasts of the versity in Changsha, China.