To Stay Alive, Some Bacteria Can Actually Shape-Shift

Superbugs are a constant concern and now there’s a new way scientists have found bacteria are changing to survive.

Transcript

00:00you've probably heard the phrase antibiotic resistant bacteria but you might not know the

00:07mechanism by which bacteria evolved to survive medical treatments some mesh with other bacteria

00:12combining to become more resilient while others simply mutate over time until some are able to

00:17survive and reproduce but now scientists are looking at a new way the microscopic pathogens

00:22are evolving to rally against modern medicine simply by changing shape researchers from

00:27carnegie mellon university university college london and the university of chicago recently

00:32introduced low levels of antibiotics into a bacteria population and over the course of just

00:3610 generations they found that the bacteria would physically change morphing from its classic

00:41looking straight form folding themselves into a c shape while surviving the antibiotic treatment

00:46the researchers believe that the wider shape provides more volume for the cell thus diluting

00:50the amount of antibiotics inside it the study's lead author shiladitya banerji said about the findings

00:56these shape changes enable bacteria to overcome the stress of antibiotics and resume fast growth

01:01what's even more curious after the antibiotic treatment was stopped the bacteria returned to

01:06their original shape after several more generations