The study, published in the journal ACS Omega in 2025, combines an old iron-based compound with modern lipid nanoparticles. This clever delivery system makes the drug more stable, targeted, and powerful than traditional treatments.

How the New TB Drug Works

The key ingredient is ferroin — a complex of iron sulfate and ortho-phenanthroline. On its own, ferroin is unstable in the stomach. To fix this, researchers led by Fernanda Manaia Demarqui encapsulated it inside lipid nanoparticles (LNP@FEP) made from simple, affordable materials: cholesterol and phosphatidylcholine.

These nanoparticles protect the drug during delivery and release it slowly and precisely inside the lungs. Once there, ferroin attacks the cell wall of Mycobacterium tuberculosis — the same way penicillin works on other bacteria. It also boosts the power of standard antibiotics like rifampicin and pretomanid.

In laboratory trials on infected mice, the new formulation outperformed isoniazid — one of the main first-line TB drugs used in Brazil and around the world. After 30 days of treatment, the lungs of the mice were completely free of TB bacteria.

This is a huge improvement over current therapy, which requires patients to take multiple antibiotics every day for at least six months — or up to two years for drug-resistant strains.

Why This Matters for Global Health

According to the World Health Organization, tuberculosis still kills more than 1.2 million people every year. In 2024 alone, there were 10.7 million new cases. Many strains have become resistant to standard drugs, making treatment longer, more expensive, and less effective.

Long treatment times also mean many patients stop taking their medicine early. This fuels the growth of drug-resistant TB. The new nanoparticle approach could shorten therapy to just one month, reduce side effects, lower costs, and slow down resistance — especially important for developing countries where TB is most common.

The research is still in the preclinical stage. The team stresses that safety and effectiveness must now be proven in human clinical trials. If successful, this technology could completely change how the world treats tuberculosis.

The work was supported by the São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP). The full paper is available open access in ACS Omega.