Lay summary
Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M. tuberculosis) is unrivalled in its capacity to infect humans. New therapeutic approaches are urgently needed to drastically reduce treatment times, improve treatment outcomes and achieve the World Health Organisation’s goal of ending tuberculosis by 2030. This proposal aims to address this by developing a novel class of antibiotics that work by simultaneously inhibiting two respiratory enzymes, which when inhibited starve M. tuberculosis of oxygen and lead to rapid bacterial death. With our Chinese collaborators at Jinan University, this will be achieved by chemically linking two antibiotics together, assessing their bactericidal potential, and their suitability as a therapeutic agent. Beyond contributions to public health, by developing novel therapeutics for M. tuberculosis, this project will make contributions to addressing the economic burden of drug-resistant M. tuberculosis that in a single year costs the global economy US$14 billion in future GDP.