The Capsule Increases Susceptibility to Last-Resort Polymyxins, but Not to Other Antibiotics, in Klebsiella pneumoniae

Francesca D’angelo (1) , Eduardo Rocha (1) , Olaya Rendueles (1)

1 Génomique évolutive des Microbes / Microbial Evolutionary Genomics

The extracellular capsule is a virulence factor present in many facultative pathogens, but its role in antimicrobial resistance remains controversial. To shed light on this debate, we tested six antibiotics on four Klebsiella pneumoniae species complex strains. Noncapsulated strains exhibited increased tolerance to polymyxins, but not to other antibiotics, as measured using the MIC. Our results urge caution on the use of therapeutic agents that target the capsule and may result in selection for its inactivation.

Mots clés: multidrug resistance; antimicrobial compounds; capsule; Klebsiella; ESKAPE pathogen; colistin

Domaines: Sciences du Vivant [q-bio]

Francesca D’angelo, Eduardo Rocha, Olaya Rendueles. The Capsule Increases Susceptibility to Last-Resort Polymyxins, but Not to Other Antibiotics, in Klebsiella pneumoniae. Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, In press, pp.Ahead of Print. ⟨10.1128/aac.00127-23⟩. ⟨pasteur-04027513⟩