A GENE that helps tuberculosis to outwit immune defences has come to
The immune system relies heavily on white blood cells called macrophages to
kill invading bacteria. Yet some TB strains shrug off the attack.
A team led by Lee Riley of Cornell University in New York suspected that a
gene in Mycobacterium tuberculosis called noxR1 was
responsible. To test this, they spliced the gene into E. coli and
These bacteria then had improved resistance to the defences of mouse
macrophages (Journal of Experimental Medicine, vol 186, p 1885). If the
same effect occurs in humans, this could lead to new TB treatments.