Platforms for the Search for New Antimicrobial Agents Using In Vivo C. elegans Models

Acta Naturae. 2024. Vol. 16. No. 4. P. 15–26.

Kalganova A., I. E. Eliseev, Smirnov I., Terekhov S.

Despite the achievements brought about by high-throughput screening technologies, there is still a lack of effective platforms to be used to search for new antimicrobial drugs. The antimicrobial activity of compounds continues, for the most part, to be assessed mainly using in vitro pathogen cultures, a situation which does not make easy a detailed investigation of the molecular mechanisms underlying host–pathogen interactions. In vivo testing of promising compounds using chordate models is labor-intensive and expensive and, therefore, is used in preclinical studies of selected drug candidates but not in primary screening. This approach does not facilitate the selection of compounds with low organ toxicity and is not suitable for the identification of therapeutic compounds that affect virulence factors. The use of microscopic nematode C. elegans to model human infections is a promising approach that enables one to investigate the host–pathogen interaction and identify anti-infective compounds with new mechanisms of action.

Keywords: microfluidics, drug discovery, Infection model, ESKAPE pathogens, C. elegans, antimicrobials