Ben-Gurion University study finds antibiotics can restore stem cells damaged by salmonella

Researchers at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev have shown in mice that a lingering salmonella infection can sap the strength of blood-forming stem cells, and that the damage can be reversed with antibiotics. The study, published in Cell Reports, was reported by the Times of Israel on 18 July 2026. It was supervised by Professor Roi Gazit, head of the stem cell laboratory in BGU's Shraga Segal Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Genetics.

Haematopoietic stem cells live in the bone marrow and produce all the body's blood and immune cells. They are the cells transferred in bone-marrow and stem-cell transplants, of which about 90,000 are carried out worldwide each year. Graduate student Erez Elfassy built a mouse model of chronic salmonella infection meant to mimic how the illness often behaves in people, using a modified bacterial strain supplied by Professor Roy Curtiss III of Arizona State University. After two weeks the mice had lost a great deal of weight and their spleens were badly swollen. Their stem cells had been pushed into an overactive, exhausted state and lost much of their ability to rebuild the blood system after transplantation.

When the infected mice were treated with antibiotics, their weight and spleen size returned to normal. Single-cell genetic analysis led by Dr Ofir Cohen showed that the stem cells had calmed down, and transplant experiments showed that their potency had recovered.

Gazit suggested the findings might one day help potential donors who are sick at the time they are needed, though an outside expert, Professor Michael Milyavsky of Tel Aviv University, noted that the results still have to be confirmed in humans.