[Microbial antagonism in the therapy of infectious diseases]

Abstract

The history of antibiotics begins with the first observations of Pasteur and Joubert about microbial antagonism at the end of the XIX century. Three types of antagonism were studied: bacterial killing by other bacteria, virus against bacteria and blockade of cellular receptors by bacterial filtrates. In the first type, the piocianase from Pseudomonas aeruginosa and the activity of Bacillus subtilis over Mycobacterium tuberculosis were the better examples; in the second, the French D'Herelle was a pioneer using bacteriophages against Shigella dysenteriae;and another French, Besredka, headed the third line with his "antivirus thérapie" on Staphylococcus aureus.