ArticleCell2018
Lysozyme Counteracts β-Lactam Antibiotics by Promoting the Emergence of L-Form Bacteria.
Article in Cell, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 68 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
68 citing papers in PubMed, 121 citations in OpenAlex.
- Bacterial strategies for surviving antibiotics during urinary tract infection: could uropathogenic Escherichia coli be persisters?Nature reviews. Urology · 2026Review
- Bacterial L-forms: Key Mechanisms of Drug Resistance, Disease Recurrence, and Immune Evasion.Indian journal of microbiology · 2026Review
- The Flavonoids Daidzein and Genistein Induce Wall-Deficient Cell Formation in Streptomyces coelicolor Under Hyperosmotic Stress.Microbial biotechnology · 2026Article
- Unravelling bacterial complexity at high resolution with single-cell transcriptomics.Nature microbiology · 2026Review
- Synergistic action of peptidoglycan and teichoic acid synthesis inhibitors leads to cell death by oxidative damage.Communications biology · 2026Article
- Alanine-scanning mutagenesis library of MreB reveals distinct roles for regulating cell shape and viability.PLoS genetics · 2026Article
- A microphysiological human mini-bladder reveals urine-urothelium interplay in tissue resilience and UPEC recurrence in urinary tract infections.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Typhoid toxin of Salmonella Typhi elicits host antimicrobial response during acute typhoid fever.EMBO molecular medicine · 2026Article
- Impact of Host and Bacterial Metabolism on Antibiotic Susceptibility.Biochemistry · 2025Review
- Article
- Engineering bacterial cell morphology for the design of robust cell factories.Biochemistry and biophysics reports · 2025Review
- Natural and induced immune responses in oral cavity and saliva.BMC immunology · 2025Review
- Resensitizing β-Lactams by Reprogramming Purine Metabolism in Small Colony Variant for Osteomyelitis Treatment.Advanced science (Weinheim, Baden-Wurttemberg, Germany) · 2025Article
- Identification of lysozyme in Venetin-1 nanoparticle from the coelomic fluid of the earthwormFrontiers in molecular biosciences · 2025Article
- Antibiotic fosmidomycin protects bacteria from cell wall perturbations by antagonizing oxidative damage-mediated cell lysis.Frontiers in microbiology · 2025Article
- Bactericidal antibiotic treatment induces damaging inflammation via TLR9 sensing of bacterial DNA.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Mechanisms conferring bacterial cell wall variability and adaptivity.Biochemical Society transactions · 2024Review
- Formation and Applications of Typical Basic Protein-Based Heteroprotein Complex Coacervations.Foods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Review
- Aquatic environment drives the emergence of cell wall-deficient dormant forms in Listeria.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Implementation of Fluorescent-Protein-Based Quantification Analysis in L-Form Bacteria.Bioengineering (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
8 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
β-lactam antibiotics inhibit bacterial cell wall assembly and, under classical microbiological culture conditions that are generally hypotonic, induce explosive cell death. Here, we show that under more physiological, osmoprotective conditions, for various Gram-positive bacteria, lysis is delayed or abolished, apparently because inhibition of class A penicillin-binding protein leads to a block in autolytic activity. Although these cells still then die by other mechanisms, exogenous lytic enzymes, such as lysozyme, can rescue viability by enabling the escape of cell wall-deficient "L-form" bacteria. This protective L-form conversion was also observed in macrophages and in an animal model, presumably due to the production of host lytic activities, including lysozyme. Our results demonstrate the potential for L-form switching in the host environment and highlight the unexpected effects of innate immune effectors, such as lysozyme, on antibiotic activity. Unlike previously described dormant persisters, L-forms can continue to proliferate in the presence of antibiotic.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.