Plasmids Will be the Death of Meee!!!

In this article researchers discovered that plasmids were the main reason that antibiotic resistance was spreading through bacteria. This is an important study because  more and more bacteria are resisting our antibiotics. UH OHHH! The problem is called multi-resistance. This is when an organism is able to survive even when exposed to multiple antibiotics. The antibiotic resistance can be transferred to the bacteria, even non-related bacteria, and can lead to human diseases. So how can this resistance be transferred to other bacteria, thus creating the bigger problem? Through conjugative plasmids, of course!
Conjugative plasmids help transfer genetic material between bacteria. A plasmid is a small DNA molecule that can separate from, and replicate independently of, the chromosomal DNA. These are those tiny circular things that we learned about in class.

This is picture shows the two different types of plasmid integrations into their host bacteria. The top shows non-integrating plasmids and the bottom shows episomes, where the plasmids integrate into the chromosome.

This research team studied IncP-1 plasmids. They mapped the origin of different IncP-1 plasmids and their ability to move and transfer informatoin between different species of bacteria. Peter Norberg, a researcher at IBUG stated, "Our results show that plasmids from the IncP-1 group have existed in, and adapted to, widely differing bacteria. They have also recombined, which means that a single plasmid can be regarded as a composite jigsaw puzzle of genes, each of which has adapted to different bacterial species" So the results showed that the plasmids can easily adapt. This tells us that despite the specie of 

the bacteria, these plasmids can move between and survive quickly in the different environments.

These plasmids are probably the #1 source in transferring the resistance genes between different bacteria. This is why this antibiotic resistance is becoming so widespread so fast.

In conclusion, this study showed that plasmids are the key source in spreading antibiotic resistance. It proved that IncP-1 plasmids move between different species of bacteria and interact directly with each other; thus, increasing the potential for the gene to be spread.