Grant: Engage Grants Program

Chelation Partners (CP) Co. develops highly efficient iron-binding polymer molecules that remove biologicallyavailable iron, making pathogens thousands of times more susceptible to antibiotics. For example, CPdeveloped the chelator DIBI, which is effective in inhibiting the growth of Gram-positive bacteria,Gram-negative bacteria, and fungi in laboratory culture. However, many bacteria are well known to formbiofilms, which contains group of bacteria cells sticking to each other and embedded within a self-producedextracellular polymeric substance-based matrix. The bacterial cells growing in a biofilm are different fromplanktonic cells of the same organism, which are free-moving single cells in a liquid medium. The strikingdifference of the bacteria in a biofilm is their much higher resistance to antibiotics than the planktonic ones.Therefore, it would be desirable to develop technology that can sensitize the biofilm to antibiotics. Since iron iscritical for biofilm growth, CP hypothesizes that the chelators DIBI may be effective to sensitize biofilmtowards antibiotic treatment. This project is proposed to test the idea with experimental evidence. Theknowledge obtained in the project is important for CP to explore the full value of its product and make decisionon how to incorporate the results into its product streams.