Dr. Peter Santa Maria develops mouse model of CSOM ear infection
Posted on August 17th, 2020
SPARK associate director Dr. Peter Santa Maria and team developed a novel mouse model of chronic suppurative otitis media, a Pseudomonal infection of the middle ear. The model can be used to investigate new potential therapies of the disease. Results were published in Science Advances on Friday.
Chronic suppurative otitis media (CSOM) is a neglected pediatric disease affecting 330 million worldwide for which no new drugs have been introduced for over a decade. Each year over 30 million kids develop CSOM.
Dr. Santa Maria’s SPARK project identified a treatment to allow non-surgical healing of perforated ear drums, a common complication of CSOM. The treatment replaces surgical repair with a single injection of a therapeutic gel into the ear canal. The team formed a startup company to develop the technology, Auration Biotech, and Astellas subsequently acquired the rights to develop the therapeutic.
As part of his SPARK project, Dr. Santa Maria and team “developed a mouse model with utility in preclinical drug evaluation and antimicrobial discovery.” Appropriate animal models to study the disease are lacking, limiting the development of new therapies for CSOM, the authors wrote in the paper. Current animal models do not replicate CSOM in terms of the chronicity of infection, tolerance, and the use of the human pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The SPARK team’s model “used immune-competent mice, tympanic membrane perforation and inoculation with luminescent Pseudomonas aeruginosa that enabled bacterial abundance tracking.”
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