Medicine Swiss researchers decode defense trick of cholera strain
How a cholera strain outwits viruses: Researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne have discovered that a certain strain of cholera has built-in immune systems.
26.05.2025, 10:45
SDA
The discovery could explain why the pathogen wreaked such havoc in Latin America in the 1990s, as the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) explained in a press release on Monday.
In a study published in the journal "Nature Microbiology", the researchers show that the WASA cholera strain (West African South American) has several defense mechanisms against so-called bacteriophages. Bacteriophages are viruses that specifically attack and kill bacteria.
The researchers examined cholera strains from Peru from the 1990s and tested their resistance to typical phages. They found at least three different antiviral systems in the genetic material that can recognize invading viruses and stop them from multiplying.
Viruses instead of antibiotics
If bacteria such as the cholera bacterium Vibrio cholerae develop increased transmissibility through the acquisition of such defense mechanisms, this also has implications for the control, monitoring and treatment of cholera, the university emphasized.
According to EPFL, understanding such protective mechanisms is crucial. This is particularly important in light of the growing interest in phage therapy, in which viruses are used to treat bacterial infections as an alternative to antibiotics.
