What if a medieval remedy became the antibiotic of the future?
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According to a new study, a 1,000-year-old natural remedy made from onion, garlic, wine, and bile salts has shown significant antibacterial potential.
Perhaps the best medicine is made from old vials. For several years, scientists have been waging a battle against antibiotic resistance. Scientists from the Faculty of Life Sciences at the University of Warwick, England say that natural antimicrobial research could provide drug candidates to fill the antibiotic discovery gap.
And a Middle Ages remedy may be the ideal candidate, as Scientific Reports reported on July 28. Bacteria can live in two ways, as individual cells or as a multicellular biofilm. The biofilm helps protect bacteria from antibiotics, making them much more difficult to treat. One of these biofilms that is particularly difficult to treat is the one that infects diabetic foot ulcers.
A promising remedy
University of Warwick researchers Dr. Freya Harrison, Jessica Furner-Pardoe and Dr. Blessing Anonye reveal that medieval methods using natural antimicrobials from everyday ingredients could help find new answers. Building on previous research by the University of Nottingham, researchers at the University of Warwick School of Life Sciences have reconstructed a 1,000-year-old medieval remedy. This elixir contains onion, garlic, wine, and bile salts. Known as "Bald's Eye Drops", this remedy has shown promising antibacterial activity.
The team also demonstrated that the mixture caused low levels of damage to human cells.
The researchers found that the remedy was effective against a variety of pathogens, it could help fight the bacteria found in diabetic foot ulcers. Wounds that must be treated quickly because they can cause ulcers and then amputation. According to the researchers, the effectiveness of the remedy cannot be attributed to a single ingredient. It is the combination of the different components that makes the preparation successful.
"We have shown that a medieval remedy made from onion, garlic, wine, and bile can kill a variety of problem bacteria grown in both plankton and biofilm. Because the mixture did not do much harm." "Damage to human cells in the laboratory or in mice, we could develop a safe and effective antibacterial treatment from the remedy," said Dr. Freya Harrison, University of Warwick School of Life Sciences.
"Most of the antibiotics we use today are derived from natural compounds, but our work underscores the need to explore not only unique compounds, but also mixtures of natural products to treat biofilm infections. We believe that the future discovery of antibiotics will Starting with natural products could be improved by studying combinations of ingredients, rather than plants or individual compounds. In this first case, we believe that this combination could suggest new treatments for infected wounds, such as diabetic foot and leg ulcers ", Dr. Freya Harrisson summarizes.
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