科學60秒:服完藥后吃點糖
Chronic infections can be caused by persistent bacteria that have learned how to [--3--] until all the antibiotics are gone. They’re not exactly antibiotic resistant, so they don’t have any special drug-destroying mutations. They just power down, metabolically speaking, and then wait until the coast is clear (of antibiotics) to come back to life. Which is why the poor patient just can’t seem to clear the infection.
To eliminate such [--4--] bacteria, scientists at Boston University searched for a way to jump start the bugs’ metabolism. And they found that sugar is just what the doctor ordered. Administering sugar along with an antibiotic called gentamicin cured mice with chronic urinary tract infections, and kept the bacteria from spreading to their kidneys.
So a [--5--] of sugar does more than make the medicine go down. It helps the medicine take the microbes down.
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