Open AccessUsing sound for microbial eradication – light at the end of the tunnel?
Author(s) -
Harris Frederick,
Dennison Sarah R.,
Phoenix David A.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
fems microbiology letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.899
H-Index - 151
eISSN - 1574-6968
pISSN - 0378-1097
DOI - 10.1111/1574-6968.12484
Subject(s) - antimicrobial , antimicrobial chemotherapy , sonodynamic therapy , antibiotic resistance , bacteria , microorganism , modality (human–computer interaction) , biology , medicine , microbiology and biotechnology , antibiotics , ultrasound , computer science , radiology , genetics , human–computer interaction
Sonodynamic antimicrobial chemotherapy ( SACT ) is a novel modality, which uses ultrasound to kill bacteria by the activation of molecules termed sonosensitisers ( SS ) to produce reactive oxygen species that are toxic to microorganism although microbial resistance to this modality has been reported. There are a growing number of SS being reported with the dual ability to be activated by both ultrasound and light, and we hypothesis that a novel antimicrobial strategy, potentially known as sonophotodynamic antimicrobial chemotherapy ( SPACT ), could be developed based on these agents. SPACT offers advantages over SACT and could constitute a new weapon in the fight against the growing global threat posed by microbial infections.