Overview
- The peer-reviewed work, published in Chemical Science, was led by IIT Bombay with Monash University collaborators.
- Using a biosafe Mycobacterium smegmatis model, researchers compared active and dormant states and mapped more than 270 membrane lipids.
- Dormant cells accumulated long, waxy fatty layers and showed reduced cardiolipin, creating a tightly packed, rigid barrier to drug entry.
- In growth-inhibition tests, dormant cells required two to ten times higher concentrations of rifabutin, moxifloxacin, amikacin, and clarithromycin, with rifabutin barely penetrating the rigid membrane.
- The team reports non-genetic drug tolerance linked to reduced permeability and plans BSL-3 validation in M. tuberculosis alongside tests of membrane-permeabilising agents such as antimicrobial peptides.