Adherent-Invasive E. Coli (AIEC) strains are immune to most antibiotics unless two different antibiotics are used in succession. Escherichia coli LF82

AIEC-LF82 is an adherent-invasive strain of E. coli bacteria that is highly linked to patients with chronic Crohn’s disease and IBD, due to its suspected ability to instigate chronic inflammation in susceptible hosts by altering gut microbiota composition, allowing it to have a greater chance of activating pro-inflammatory gene expression. Adherent-invasive E. Coli (AIEC) strains tend to colonize the intestinal mucosa by invading intestinal epithelial cells and macrophages, which results in very high levels of secretion of pro-inflammatory cytokines, which ultimately contributes to chronic inflammation. Because of the aforementioned, I began to presume that antibiotic treatments would enable the prevention of AIEC bacteria from colonizing and thriving, since the infection cycle of adherent-invasive E. coli appears to depend heavily on the ability of these bacteria to colonize in the gastrointestinal tract of genetically predisposed Crohn's disease and IBD patients. I grew the AIEC-LF82 bacteria on six, individual agar plates with a different antibiotic solution on each, except for a control plate. I used Penicillin-Streptomycin, Kanamycin-Chloramphenicol, antimicrobial peptide (AMP), Kanamycin, SPE phase tetracycline antibiotics to test resistance, and noticed that each of the antibiotics alone, proved to be infective, since the untransformed AIEC bacteria were still able to grow very similarly to how they would on a regular lb agar plate. Antibiotic and probiotic therapies appear to be a poor choice for therapeutic treatment of ileal Crohn’s disease and IBD, at first glance. However, I noticed that plates #1 and #2 were able to completely halt the colonization and growth of AIEC LF82 bacteria. In conclusion, it appears that using two different, combined antibiotics may be a viable future treatment for patients suffering from Crohn’s disease, since it appears to completely prevent the growth of AIEC bacteria, also destroying any plasmids that the bacteria may have obtained in the process. Thus, Penicillin-Streptomycin and Kanamycin-Chloramphenicol antibiotic solutions appear to be two substantially potent treatments for patients suffering from Crohn's disease and IBD.