Thanks to their great capacity for adaptation, the bacteria gradually learn to resist antibiotic treatment. French Researchers involving Inserm, University Paris Descartes, the INRA, the Pasteur Institute and CNRS have shown that one of their strategies to divert fatty acids present in human blood for their own growth .

Bacteria are able to survive to adapt quickly to new environments, including the presence of antibiotics. Their genetic material evolves and diversifies, the resistant germs are selected and the treatment becomes ineffective. In recent years, bacteria pathogenic for humans are largely resistant to antibiotics.

French Researchers involving Inserm, University Paris Descartes, the INRA, the Pasteur Institute and CNRS have shown that Gram-positive bacteria major pathogenic to humans (streptococci, staphylococci and enterococci) are capable of using fatty acids abundantly present in human blood to build their membrane. They can thus escape the activity of antibiotics meant to prevent them from making their own fatty acids.

These are the major constituents of bacterial membranes and their biosynthesis is considered essential to the integrity of the bacterial cell. Therefore, the enzymes that allow the biosynthesis of fatty acids are proposed as potential targets for the development of antibiotics, some of which, already validated by pharmaceutical companies which inhibit the growth of bacteria in vitro.