GlgE does not exist in humans so it is safe to inactivate it with a drug. Another sugar called trehalose commonly found in the human diet could conceivably be used to make an anti-GlgE drug more potent. If dietary trehalose reached the bacteria it would increase the levels of maltose 1-phosphate even further.
"This pathway has never previously been targeted by antimicrobials and offers a treatment option very different from antibiotics in use," says Dr William Jacobs, Jr. from Einstein, senior and corresponding author of the study.
The John Innes Centre is an Institute of the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), which funded Dr Steph Bornemann's work on this project.
A patent was filed in November 2009 on behalf of Einstein and JIC. John Innes Centre's rights in the technology have been assigned to JIC's IP management and technology transfer company, PBL, Norwich. PBL and Einstein are working together to secure the intellectual property and engage with partners to develop this innovation and find inhibitors of GlgE that could be developed into anti-TB drugs.
Source John Innes Centre