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Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, May 2005, p. 2008-2014, Vol. 49, No. 5
0066-4804/05/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/AAC.49.5.2008-2014.2005
Copyright © 2005, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
Lethality of Quinolones against Mycobacterium smegmatis in the Presence or Absence of Chloramphenicol
Muhammad Malik,1
Tao Lu,1
Xilin Zhao,1
Anubha Singh,1
Christopher M. Hattan,3
John Domagala,2
Robert Kerns,3 and
Karl Drlica1*
Public Health Research Institute, 225 Warren Street, Newark, New Jersey 07103,1
Pfizer Global Research and Development, 2800 Plymouth Road, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48105,2
Division of Medicinal and Natural Products Chemistry, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 522423
Received 5 October 2004/
Returned for modification 29 November 2004/
Accepted 11 January 2005

ABSTRACT
Quinolones were examined for rapid lethal activity against
Mycobacterium smegmatis in the presence and absence of chloramphenicol, an
inhibitor of protein synthesis. C-8 methoxy, C-6 fluorine, and
particular C-7 ring substituents enhanced rapid killing. With
the surprising exception of moxifloxacin, higher quinolone concentrations
were required for lethal activity in the presence of chloramphenicol
than in its absence. Moxifloxacin was also unusual in lacking
the time lag characteristic of fluoroquinolone lethality. Several
fluoroquinolone dimers, which represent quinolones with large
C-7 substituents, showed modest bacteriostatic activity. Unlike
other quinolones, the dimers failed to display lethal activity.
The insensitivity of moxifloxacin to chloramphenicol has not
been observed with other bacteria and may therefore reflect
unique aspects of mycobacterial gyrase.

INTRODUCTION
The fluoroquinolones are lethal, broad-spectrum antibacterial
agents that are receiving increasing attention as potential
antituberculosis agents. Two new C-8 methoxy derivatives, gatifloxacin
and moxifloxacin, exhibit good activity against
Mycobacterium tuberculosis, both in vitro (
5,
12,
16) and in a murine model
of tuberculosis (
1,
14,
22). Moxifloxacin is now being used
clinically (
7). However, the lethal activity of the compounds
may be reduced by cotreatment with rifampin (
12), a first-line
antituberculosis drug, and like many other antimycobacterial
compounds, fluoroquinolones have marginal activity against nongrowing
cells (
20,
21). The latter feature may be particularly problematic
because
M. tuberculosis appears to enter a nongrowing, dormant
stage shortly after infection (
15,
17). Thus, understanding
how the quinolones rapidly kill bacteria, especially in the
absence of growth, is likely to be important.
The quinolones reversibly trap gyrase on DNA as complexes in which the DNA is broken (6, 18, 19). The complexes block DNA replication, thereby explaining the bacteriostatic action of the drugs. After long incubation, the absence of DNA replication leads to cell death through unspecified events. Lethal action can also be seen for short drug treatments if drug concentration is raised to roughly 5 to 10 times the MIC. This rapid lethal action is thought to be due to chromosome fragmentation arising from release of DNA breaks from protein-mediated constraints present in the drug-gyrase-DNA complexes (2). By expressing quinolone concentrations required for rapid death as multiples of bacteriostatic concentrations (fold of MIC), quinolones can be indirectly compared for chromosome fragmentation, independent of effects on processes such as drug uptake, drug efflux, and formation of quinolone-enzyme-DNA complexes.
In the present work, we examined Mycobacterium smegmatis for the effect of several quinolone substituents on rapid lethal action. Surprising activities were observed with moxifloxacin and quinolone dimers. Moxifloxacin killed cells equally well in the presence and absence of chloramphenicol, an agent widely known to interfere with quinolone lethality (2, 3). Dimer treatment of M. smegmatis is the first example of bacterial growth being blocked by a quinolone without rapid killing of growing cells.

MATERIALS AND METHODS
Bacterial strains and culture conditions.
M. smegmatis mc
2155 was obtained from S. Cole, Institut Pasteur,
Paris, France. Liquid cultures were grown in Middlebrook 7H9
medium containing 10% albumin and 0.05% Tween 80 (
9); colonies
were grown at 37°C on 7H10 agar plates with or without fluoroquinolone.
Bacterial doubling time was 4 h.
Fluoroquinolones.
Fluoroquinolones identified by PD numbers were products of Parke-Davis Pharmaceutical Division of Pfizer, Ann Arbor, MI. Fluoroquinolones identified by BMS numbers were obtained from Bristol-Myers-Squibb (Wallingford, CT). Fluoroquinolone dimers were prepared as described previously (11). Ciprofloxacin, Bay y3114, and moxifloxacin were obtained from Bayer Corp. (West Haven, CT). Fluoroquinolones were dissolved in 0.1 ml of 1 M NaOH (1/10 of the final volume), and then sterile water was added to obtain a final concentration of 10 mg/ml. Fluoroquinolone dimers were dissolved in dimethyl sulfoxide to 2 mg/ml. Stock solutions, divided into aliquots, were stored at 80°C. Dilutions were prepared with sterile distilled water. Solutions were kept at 20°C for several weeks during the course of experiments.
Measurement of fluoroquinolone susceptibility.
Inhibition of growth was defined as the minimal quinolone concentration required to inhibit colony formation by 99% [MIC(99)] after incubation on quinolone-containing agar for 3 days. Cultures contained about 5 x 108 CFU/ml prior to serial dilution and plating. For these determinations, fluoroquinolone concentration increments differed by no more than 25% per increment. MIC(99) was used rather than the standard MIC because it can be measured more accurately and because bactericidal effects are less likely to affect its value.
To measure lethal action, cells were grown in 7H9 liquid medium to mid-log phase at 37°C with shaking. Cells were split into 2-ml aliquots, and various concentrations of quinolone were added. For the measurement of killing in the absence of protein synthesis, chloramphenicol was added to a concentration of 20 µg/ml 1 h prior to addition of quinolone (15 µg/ml is sufficient to block growth within minutes; 20 µg/ml has no lethal effect and lowers protein synthesis to <1% in 20 min). After incubation for 5 or 18 h with shaking, cells were diluted in 7H9 medium and applied to 7H10 agar plates lacking drug. Growth was for 2 to 3 days to determine the fraction of surviving cells. A zero-time drug control was taken at the time of quinolone addition. Survival was calculated relative to bacterial CFU at zero time.

RESULTS
Effect of fluoroquinolone structure on bacteriostatic and bactericidal action. Susceptibility of
M. smegmatis to a series of fluoroquinolones
that differed at the C-8 position and in the C-7 ring system
was determined (quinolone structures are shown in Table
1).
In general, a C-8 methoxy moiety increased bacteriostatic activity
[lower MIC
(99)], except for derivatives with a large alkyl group
attached to the C-7 piperazinyl ring (Table
2).
To assess rapid lethal activity, exponentially growing
M. smegmatis was treated with various concentrations of each compound for
slightly more than one doubling time (5 h). The fraction of
surviving CFU was measured; in all cases, rapid killing required
drug concentrations well above MIC
(99). Quin-olone concentrations
were then normalized to MIC
(99) to correct for differences in
drug uptake and formation of bacteriostatic quinolone-gyrase-DNA
complexes. For six out of seven pairs of compounds differing
in C-7 ring structure, the presence of a C-8 methoxy group increased
lethal activity (Fig.
1). The exception occurred with compounds
that contained an
N-ethyl moiety on the C-7 piperazinyl ring:
the C-8 methoxy compound PD161144 was not more active than its
C-8-H derivative PD160788 when quinolone concentration was normalized
to MIC
(99) (Fig.
1). Moxifloxacin and BMS-433368, two compounds
with large, complex C-7 ring systems, displayed no more lethality
than some of the other C-8 methoxy compounds (Table
2; Fig.
1).
Effect of C-8 methoxy and C-7 ring substituents on quinolone-mediated lethal activity in the absence of protein synthesis.
Comparison of quinolone lethality in the presence of chloramphenicol
revealed little activity for seven compounds that contained
a hydrogen at position C-8 (Fig.
1). In contrast, the C-8 methoxy
compounds displayed lethal activity that in some cases was influenced
by moieties attached to the C-7 ring (Fig.
1). Moxifloxacin
was insensitive to chloramphenicol and exhibited the greatest
activity in the absence of protein synthesis (Fig.
1). BMS-433368,
a C-8 methoxy compound that also contains a large, complex C-7
ring system, exhibited bacteriostatic and bactericidal activities
that were similar to those observed with moxifloxacin (Table
2). However, BMS-433368 lethality was inhibited by chloramphenicol
(Fig.
2) to an extent similar to that seen with compounds having
a smaller C-7 ring system, such as PD135042 (Fig.
1). Thus,
the unusual behavior of moxifloxacin is not readily explained
by the size of its C-7 ring system.
Effect of C-6-F and C-8-OCHF2 groups on quinolone-mediated lethality in the presence and absence of chloramphenicol.
Fluoroquinolones are defined in part by a fluorine attached
to position C-6. This substituent is absent from the newly developed
agent garenoxacin (Table
1). To assess the effect of C-6 fluorine
moiety, we compared lethal activity for garenoxacin with its
C-6 fluorine derivative, BMS-340280 (Fig.
2). In the presence
or absence of chloramphenicol, garenoxacin was less lethal,
indicating that a C-6 fluorine is important for lethal events
occurring after complex formation with gyrase and DNA. Compound
BMS-340280, which has a difluoromethoxy moiety at the C-8 position,
was slightly less active than its C-8 methoxy derivative, BMS-433368,
in the absence of chloramphenicol; little difference was observed
in the presence of chloramphenicol (Table
2; Fig.
2).
Rapid killing by moxifloxacin.
Moxifloxacin killed M. smegmatis equally well in the presence and absence of chloramphenicol (Fig. 1). It also killed cells without a detectable time lag (Fig. 3A), while a 60-min delay in lethal action was seen with PD161148, a compound that exhibited lethal activity at the same concentration [fold of MIC(99)] as moxifloxacin in the absence of chloramphenicol (Fig. 3B) but less activity in the presence of chloramphenicol (Fig. 3C). These data are consistent with moxifloxacin killing M. smegmatis by a pathway that does not require newly made protein.
Bacteriostatic and bactericidal action of fluoroquinolone dimers.
Fluoroquinolone dimers are known to block the growth of gram-positive
bacteria, in some cases more effectively than monomers (
8,
10,
11). Since dimers can be viewed as quinolones having large C-7
ring systems, we tested several with
M. smegmatis in the presence
and absence of chloramphenicol (see Fig.
4 for structures).
Bacteriostatic activity [MIC
(99)] varied considerably among
the compounds (Table
3), with ciprofloxacin dimers exhibiting
more activity than norfloxacin or gatifloxacin dimers. For this
small sample of compounds, the butenyl linker appeared to confer
the greatest activity. When dimer compounds were examined for
lethality in the presence or absence of chloramphenicol, the
four most active compounds showed only marginal killing after
18 h of exposure (Fig.
5); compounds with MIC
(99) (>10 µg/ml)
were not tested. The norfloxacin dimer (Fig.
5) was notable
because it was unable to completely block growth in liquid medium
at 20 times the concentration that inhibited growth on agar
plates.

DISCUSSION
Lethal activity is an important property of fluoroquinolones
because it is expected to reduce the number of repeated treatments
needed to control bacterial infections and thereby shorten treatment
time. High concentrations of quinolone are required to rapidly
kill
M. smegmatis, in some cases 10 to 30 times the concentration
needed to inhibit growth (Table
2). While these concentrations
are higher than would be used clinically with pathogens, they
provide a way to attribute specific features of quinolone structure
to particular aspects of quinolone action. For example, C-8
methoxy and C-6 fluorine moieties enhanced killing when quinolone
concentration was expressed as a multiple of MIC
(99) (Fig.
1 and
2). With this normalization, lethal action is assumed to
reflect chromosome fragmentation distinct from complex formation
(with
Escherichia coli, nalidixic acid lethality parallels chromosome
fragmentation, which is seen as a loss of cell lysate viscosity
in the absence of the protein denaturant sodium dodecyl sulfate;
lethality does not parallel complex formation, which is seen
as a loss of viscosity in the presence of sodium dodecyl sulfate
[M. Malik, unpublished data]). The C-6 and C-8 substituents
also enhanced lethality in the presence of chloramphenicol (Fig.
1 and
2), an agent that generally reduces rapid lethality (Fig.
1). In some cases the methoxy substituent also improved bacteriostatic
activity (Table
2); in previous work, we reported that the methoxy
group enhanced both bacteriostatic and bactericidal activity
against gyrase resistance mutants (
4,
13,
23). Thus, a C-8 methoxy
group enhances many different aspects of quinolone action.
Moxifloxacin displayed two behaviors that were unusual among the compounds tested. First, its lethal action was comparable in the presence and absence of chloramphenicol (Fig. 1). Second, killing by moxifloxacin lacked a characteristic time lag (Fig. 3A). Examination of E. coli failed to show a similar behavior for moxifloxacin (Malik, unpublished). However, a lack of sensitivity to chloramphenicol was observed for nalidixic acid with an E. coli mutant expected to have an altered GyrA-GyrA dimer interface, and the mutation enhanced the ability of nalidixic acid to fragment chromosomes in the absence of protein synthesis (Malik, unpublished). Thus, it is likely that the unusual activity of moxifloxacin in mycobacteria also involves enhanced chromosome fragmentation.
Since moxifloxacin kills mycobacteria in the absence of protein synthesis, its activity should be less susceptible than that of other quinolones to interference by rifampin (12), an important component of tuberculosis therapy that indirectly inhibits protein synthesis. Experiments are now in progress to determine whether moxifloxacin behaves against M. tuberculosis as it does against M. smegmatis. If so, the compound may prove useful for exploring the effects of growth arrest generated in ways that are more likely to be relevant to tuberculosis (17, 21).
Quinolone dimers have been studied previously with Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus pneumoniae (8, 10, 11). With S. pneumoniae, resistance to a dimer mapped in gyrA, indicating that gyrase is an intracellular target (8). As with previous work, susceptibility of M. smegmatis to dimers depended on both the type of quinolone moiety and the type of cross-linker (Table 3). Surprisingly, even dimers that displayed bacteriostatic activity (Table 3) failed to rapidly kill M. smegmatis (Fig. 5). One possible explanation is that binding of one quinolone dimer to one GyrA subunit precludes binding of a second quinolone dimer to the other GyrA subunit, thereby allowing single-strand, rather than lethal double-strand, DNA breaks to be trapped in drug-enzyme-DNA complexes. We are now examining S. aureus to determine whether the lack of lethal activity by quinolone dimers is a general phenomenon.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We thank Marila Gennaro, Anthony Maxwell, and Richard Pine for
critical comments on the manuscript.
This work was supported by NIH grant AI 35257.

FOOTNOTES
* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Public Health Research Institute, 225 Warren St., Newark, NJ 07103. Phone: (973) 854-3360. Fax: (973) 854-3101. E-mail:
drlica{at}phri.org.


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Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, May 2005, p. 2008-2014, Vol. 49, No. 5
0066-4804/05/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/AAC.49.5.2008-2014.2005
Copyright © 2005, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
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