You are interested in developing a broad-spectrum treatment…
You are interested in developing a broad-spectrum treatment for bacterial infections and you come across a family of proteins called “uncouplers” which act on membranes and make them leaky to H+ (protons) and unable to prevent H+ (proton) movement across the membrane. You test an uncoupler on a few different cultures of bacterial pathogens and find that the cells die rather quickly. Based on what you have learned in this class so far about microbial metabolism, please specifically explain why the cells died.