Antidepressant desvenlafaxine identified in wastewater promotes transformation and antibiotic resistance risk in Acinetobacter baylyi ADP1 via metabolic adaptations.

Desvenlafaxine significantly increases bacterial transformation frequency in Acinetobacter baylyi ADP1 at 10 and 50 mg/L, promoting potential antibiotic resistance spread.

• Why it matters: Understanding how non-antibiotic pharmaceuticals like antidepressants influence antibiotic resistance transfer is crucial, as wastewater treatment plants are reservoirs of resistance genes and these compounds are widely detected in effluents.
• What they did: Researchers used natural transformation assays with Acinetobacter baylyi ADP1 (n=6) to examine desvenlafaxine's effects, measuring transformation frequency, membrane properties, proteomics, and electron microscopy.
• The result: Desvenlafaxine enhances bacterial competence through envelope modifications without toxicity, suggesting a non-oxidative, surface-mediated pathway that may facilitate resistance gene transfer in environmental bacteria.