Vol.56 No.4 July 2008
Physiological functions of drug efflux systems in Gram-negative bacteria: Their roles in bacterial drug resistance and virulence
1)Department of Cell Membrane Biology, Institute of Scientific and Industrial Research, Osaka University, 8-1 Mihogaoka, Ibaraki, Osaka, Japan
2)Department of Cell Biology, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Osaka University
3)PRESTO, Japan Science and Technology Agency
Abstract
Drug efflux systems produce multidrug resistance by exporting antibiotics from the cells. It is well established that drug efflux systems encoded by bacteria can confer clinically relevant resistance to antibiotics. Genomic analysis has resulted in the identification of many genes proposed to code for drug efflux systems. Bacterial genome sequences have allowed us to identify the drug-resistance gene libraries of bacteria. On the other hand, recent discoveries support the notion that at least some drug efflux systems have specific physiological substrates, because these efflux systems have been shown to have roles in bacterial virulence. Because drug efflux systems have roles in bacterial multidrug resistance and virulence, we propose that these systems have greater clinical relevance than is usually attributed to them.
Key word
drug efflux system, multidrug resistance, virulence
Received
February 20, 2008
Accepted
May 16, 2008
Jpn. J. Chemother. 56 (4): 443-452, 2008
