Bacterial capitalism.

Looks like if you want bacteria to work their hardest for you, they need healthy competition.

Scientists across the globe are looking for ways to make new antibiotics. Some projects involve melding existing drugs into potent new molecules, while other approaches focus on designing new drugs that target specific mechanisms of microbial resistance. But recent sequencing studies suggest that bacteria possess an untapped well of novel antibiotics that they don't produce under normal lab conditions, thereby remaining hidden to scientists for decades.

Scientists working in Anthony Sinskey's lab at MIT sequenced the genome of a strain of soil-dwelling bacteria known as Rhodococcus fascians. They were surprised to find that this organism, not known for its antibiotic-producing powers, harbored a number of genes involved in the metabolism of antibiotic-like compounds. (In the wild, bacteria produce antibiotics as a survival mechanism, to clear themselves a niche in the crowded microbial world.)

While Rhodococcus seemed genetically capable of producing the compounds, the organisms did not do so in the lab--until, that is, they were grown alongside another type of bacteria, called Streptomyces, which are among the most prolific antibiotic producers in the microbial world. Microbiologist Kazuhiko Kurosawa and his colleagues published their discovery last month in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

The little fellows starting churning out a toxin that killed H. pylori, the bacteria that causes stomach ulcers. It isn't clear whether the new compound is appropriate for use in humans, but it contains "a novel structural component, which could provide a jumping-off point for chemists keen to design new drugs."

Previous sequencing research suggests that some strains have the genetic ability to produce 20 to 30 different antibiotics, but when grown on their own in comfortable lab conditions, they produce only two or three. "Where are the other 90 percent?" asks Fischbach. "I think [Kurosawa's] approach is the right way to explore this."