Étude des mécanismes moléculaires impliqués dans l'acquisition de la résistance aux antiobiotiques chez Mycobacterium tubertulosis : vers l'inhibition allostérique de cibles enzymatiques à fort potentiel thérapeutique.

Chercheurs boursiers - Junior 1 | Concours 2012-2013

Nicolas Doucet

Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS)


Domaine : Maladies infectieuses et immunitaires

Despite popular belief, tuberculosis (TB) remains one of the most virulent bacterial diseases to ever affect human beings, killing between 1.6 and 2 million people each year. This is primarily due to failure of traditional drug treatment caused by the emergence of multi-drug resistant bacteria in the environment. Recent studies have shown that an effective drug combination of antibiotics can be used to treat TB infection in laboratory settings, but it is yet unknown if bacteria causing TB will acquire resistance to this drug mixture in real clinical settings. If so, this would severely hamper the efficiency of future TB treatments, both clinically and economically. Using techniques that mimic natural evolution, our research will test this hypothesis and investigate whether an alternative inhibitory path could be used to counteract a potential resistance acquisition by TB. We will also apply our unique methodology to the study of other clinically-relevant systems, such as enzymes involved in cancer and HIV inactivation.