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ANTIMICROBIALS

A radical way to die

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Recent work finds that reactive oxygen species are generated in cells starved for the nucleobase thymine and contribute to DNA-destructive “thymineless death” mechanisms, which underlie the activities of many drugs, including trimethoprim and sulfa-based antibiotics. Such mechanisms may also apply to cells across the tree of life.

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Fig. 1: Reactive oxygen species in thymineless death.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Molecular and Human Genetics and the Dan L. Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX, USA

    Philip J. Hastings & Susan M. Rosenberg

  2. Departments of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and Molecular Virology and Microbiology at Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX, USA

    Susan M. Rosenberg

Authors
  1. Philip J. Hastings
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  2. Susan M. Rosenberg
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Correspondence to Philip J. Hastings or Susan M. Rosenberg.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Hastings, P.J., Rosenberg, S.M. A radical way to die. Nat Microbiol 2, 1582–1583 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41564-017-0074-6

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