Despite this intense work into finding ways to break up biofilms, it's not clear that scientists will easily find a way to thwart these tenacious structures. "I'm not aware of anything that looks to me like a home run," Ehrlich says. "Biofilms are the preferred mode of growth for most bacteria -- they've been doing it for literally billions of years."

He and colleagues are looking toward prevention rather than treatment. In the case of middle-ear infections, for instance, they believe that giving children specially engineered probiotics, or "good" bacteria, early in life may help prevent infectious bacteria from settling down in the ears in the first place.

Whatever the best cure turns out to be, though, this finding -- that biofilms may underlie ear and other chronic infections -- suggests that trying to treat them with rounds of conventional antibiotics is futile, and only promotes drug resistance. Bill Costerton, director of the University of Southern California's Center for Biofilms, calls this study a "pivotal paper" that will change the way these infections are treated and persuade doctors, particularly those in the United States, to "stop throwing antibiotics at biofilm infections that are basically resistant."