PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Corey S. Westfall
AU  - Petra Anne Levin
TI  - High levels of antibiotic tolerance and persistence are induced by the commercial anti-microbial triclosan
AID  - 10.1101/090829
DP  - 2016 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 090829
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/12/01/090829.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/12/01/090829.full
AB  - Antimicrobial tolerance and bacterial persistence are confounding factors in the treatment of recurrent and chronic infections. Here we report that the anti-microbial additive triclosan renders Escherichia coli and methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus tolerant to a panel of bactericidal antibiotics. Triclosan treatment increased antimicrobial tolerance up to 10,000 fold, amplified persister populations by several orders of magnitude, and in one instance, rendered E. coli refractile to the cell wall active antibiotic, ampicillin.