Mycoplasma infection drives EGFR-TKI resistance through convergent transcriptomic reprogramming in non-small cell lung cancer
Bing Wang, Valentina Donati, Alessandro Gregori, Alessandro Leonetti, Aldo Pastore, Dongmei Deng, Elisa Giovannetti · 2026
Read Mycoplasma infection drives EGFR-TKI resistance through convergent transcriptomic reprogramming in non-small cell lung cancer by Bing Wang, Valentina Donati, Alessandro Gregori, Alessandro Leonetti, Aldo Pastore, Dongmei Deng, Elisa Giovannetti (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/PMC13453009.txt.
Description
Wang and colleagues showed in 2026 that mycoplasma infection, a common and often silent cell culture contaminant, can make lung cancer cells resist targeted EGFR drugs. These drugs block a growth signal many lung cancers depend on, but resistance almost always emerges. The team found the germ itself helps cells shrug off the drug osimertinib.
Infected cells kept growth and survival signals switched on and pulled the drug's target inside the cell more slowly, blunting its effect. Clearing the infection with antibiotics partly restored drug sensitivity, which pins the germ as a cause, not a bystander. Gene profiles pointed to shared pathways between infection and resistance. Blocking two support routes at once suppressed infected cells better. Patient data agreed: infection and high levels of a key enzyme tracked with shorter survival.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Bing Wang, Valentina Donati, Alessandro Gregori, Alessandro Leonetti, Aldo Pastore, Dongmei Deng, Elisa Giovannetti |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 79 KB |
| LICENSE | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |