Exploring Rifamycin Inactivation from the Soil Microbiome

Abstract

Our battle against pathogens has become a challenge due to the rise in antibiotic resistance and the dwindling number of new antibiotics entering the clinic. Most antibiotics owe their origins to soil bacteria, which have been producing these natural products for millennia. The rifamycins are products of actinomycetes and semisynthetic derivatives of these have been very successful in the clinic. Rifampin (RIF) has been a cornerstone agent against tuberculosis for over 50 years. In the clinic, pathogens typically develop RIF resistance by mutation of the drug. Nonetheless, a number of diverse RIF resistance mechanisms have been described, including enzymatic inactivation. Environmental bacteria are multidrug resistant, likely due to sharing the same niche as antibiotic producers and represent a reservoir of ancient resistance determinants. Furthermore, these resistance determinants have been linked to pathogens. Exploring the antibiotic resistome, the collection of all antibiotic resistance determinants from the global microbiota, reveals the diversity and evolution of resistance and provides insight on vulnerabilities of our current antibiotics. Herein, I describe a diverse collection of RIF-inactivating mechanisms from soil actinomycetes. I identified heretofore unknown RIF glycosyltransferase and RIF phosphotransferase genes (rgt and rph, respectively). RGT and RPH enzymes display broad rifamycin specificity and contribute to high-level resistance. Interestingly, RIF-sensitive Gram-positive pathogens are carriers of RPH, highlighting the existence of a ‘silent’ resistome in clinically relevant bacteria and emphasize the importance of studying resistance from environmental bacteria. Furthermore, I identified a conserved upstream DNA motif associated with RIF-inactivating genes from actinomycetes and demonstrate its role in RIF-responsive gene regulation. Finally, I explore the use of a RIF-resistance guided approach to identify novel rifamycin producing bacteria. This study expands the rifamycin resistome, provides evidence of vulnerabilities of our current arsenal of rifamycin antibiotics, and offers a strategy to identify new members of this family natural product family.