A Safe, Tolerable, Non-Antibiotic Agent to Prevent or Treat Infection (UA18-039)

This invention is an advancement of a Lactobacillus system that represents a vaccine platform to express surface antigens to mitigate infection. This has potential for COVID-19 therapeutics, targeting Clostridium Difficile through specific self-destruction modifications. Two synthetic biologic agents based on lactic acid bacteria have been engineered to express C. difficile surface proteins andsubsequently adhere to intestinal epithelial cells, mitigating infection of C. difficile.Background:Clostridium difficile is an antibiotic-resistant bacteria that propagates quickly after antibiotics have eliminated growth competitors, causing antibiotic-related diarrhea. New strains have proven to be safe and effective in animal studies and have several bio control measures, including loss of plasmid at body temperature unless integrated into the bacteria, as well as loss of the lactic acid bacterial strains after a few days due to engineered auxotrophies. These strains are lost from the GI tract unless continually dosed, making them a safe, inexpensive and effective alternative to antibiotic treatment of C. difficile.Learn more at https://bit.ly/UA18-039 Anne Spieth annes@tla.arizona.edu 520-626-1577