Sci Rep: Scientists have discovered new symptoms of tuberculosis.

August 11, 2020 /--- -- An interdisciplinary team of Dutch researchers recently found a decline in levels of specific metabolites in TB patients, which is common in all human and animal species.
the findings provide new opportunities to diagnose and predict TB.
team, led by Herman Spaink, a professor of molecular cell biology at Leiden University, studied metabolites (intermediates and end products) produced by TB infection in human and animal models.
observed a significant decrease in ten metabolites in all the TB organisms studied.
(Photo: www.pixabay.com) Tuberculosis is a disease caused by Mycobacteria tuberculosis.
year, 10 million people worldwide get the disease, 1.6 million of whom die from it.
, although TB can be treated with antibiotics in many cases, there are many concerns: scientists are finding that more and more bacteria are resistant to many types of antibiotics.
even some mutants are already resistant to all antibiotics we know.
is a debilitating disease characterized by the destruction of tissues such as muscles.
is therefore actually a physical drain.
usually, this is even the cause of death from the disease.
ideally, drugs could be used to cure the symptoms of TB-induced wasting.
but in practice there is no suitable treatment because we lack awareness of its pathogenesis.
Spaink said: "We wanted to know whether the decline in certain metabolites was a general symptom of TB or related to the nutritional status of people in areas where TB is common.
then we examined blood samples from Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC) and found a significant reduction in ten metabolites in TB patients.
then applied the same method to other animal models, including zebrafish larvae.
surprised us that, just like humans, bacteria infect these organisms with exactly the same reduction in metabolites.
" results show that the disease has the same pathogenic characteristics in mammals and fish.
most importantly, we can now study the disease extensively in zebrafish larvae, and these results can be translated into humans," he said.
, for example, we want to find out which genes work.
if we knew how it worked, we could develop drugs to fight the disease.
," Spaink said.
(bioon.com) Source: Scientists find strong evidence that wasting syndrome is same for all organisms Original source: Yi Ding et al. Tuberculosis causes highly conserved metabolic changes in human patients, mycobacteria-infected mice and zebrafish larvae, Scientific Reports (2020). DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-68443-y.