Skip to main content
Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy logoLink to Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy
. 1993 Aug;37(8):1685–1689. doi: 10.1128/aac.37.8.1685

Mathematical model for comparison of time-killing curves.

F Guerillot 1, G Carret 1, J P Flandrois 1
PMCID: PMC188042  PMID: 8215284

Abstract

The relevance of mathematical modeling to investigations of the bactericidal effects of antimicrobial agents has been emphasized in many studies of killing kinetics. We propose here a descriptive model of general use, with four parameters which account for the lag phase, the initial number of bacteria, and the limit of effectiveness and bactericidal rate of antimicrobial agents. The model has been applied to several kinetic datum sets with amoxicillin, cephalothin, nalidixic acid, pefloxacin, and ofloxacin against two Escherichia coli strains. It is a useful tool to compare killing curves by taking into account model parameter confidence limits. This can be illustrated by studying drug effects, strain effects, and concentration effects. For the antibiotics used here, concentration effects had an influence mainly on the length of the lag phase and the minimum number of living cells observed. It is therefore clear that differences in the killing curves with changes in one or more parameters could occur.

Full text

PDF
1685

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Carret G., Flandrois J. P., Lobry J. R. Biphasic kinetics of bacterial killing by quinolones. J Antimicrob Chemother. 1991 Mar;27(3):319–327. doi: 10.1093/jac/27.3.319. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Cerf O. Tailing of survival curves of bacterial spores. J Appl Bacteriol. 1977 Feb;42(1):1–19. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2672.1977.tb00665.x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Flandrois J. P., Carret G., Fardel G. Etude mathématique de la courbe de mortalité d'Escherichia coli exposé aux aminosides. Pathol Biol (Paris) 1988 May;36(5):446–451. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Flandrois J. P., Fardel G., Carret G. Early stages of in vitro killing curve of LY146032 and vancomycin for Staphylococcus aureus. Antimicrob Agents Chemother. 1988 Apr;32(4):454–457. doi: 10.1128/aac.32.4.454. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. Mattie H. Kinetics of antimicrobial action. Rev Infect Dis. 1981 Jan-Feb;3(1):19–27. doi: 10.1093/clinids/3.1.19. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy are provided here courtesy of American Society for Microbiology (ASM)

RESOURCES