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Nature Medicine 11, 599 - 600 (2005)
doi:10.1038/nm0605-599

A low-carb diet for a high-octane pathogen

H I Boshoff1 & C E Barry III1

  1. The authors are in the Tuberculosis Research Section, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease, National Institutes of Health, Rockville, Maryland 20852, USA. e-mail: cbarry@niaid.nih.gov


Mycobacterium tuberculosis adapts to the low-glucose conditions in its host by using lipids as a fuel source. This adaptation reveals a weak flank that might be exploited in drug development, as shown in work on mice and human cells (pages 638–644).


More than a century has elapsed since the seminal discovery by Robert Koch that Mycobacterium tuberculosis is the etiological agent of tuberculosis. Koch's discovery hinged on figuring out how to coax the finicky, slow-growing bacterium to thrive on laboratory Petri plates with just the right mixture of nutrients.

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