Role of Elevated Airway Glucose (and Other Biochemicals) in Bacterial Infections

Bacteria that live in the airways need something to eat: they mainly use host derived biochemicals, for example glucose. Regulation of airway biochemicals is a host mechanism to control infection. When levels of airway biochemicals are dysregulated, bacterial colonisation increases, enabling infection. We investigated how changes in airway glucose effect bacterial infection.

Inflamed airways in patients with COPD may be enriched for biochemicals that support growth, leading to greater colonisation and infection, therefore reducing biochemical availability represents a new anti-bacterial strategy. In future we aim to investigate the effect of metformin on airway glucose in COPD.