Vinegar is undoubtedly one of the most versatile tools in both the kitchen and the rest of your home. Not only can you use it in dressings, marinades, and , but it’s also an excellent cleaning agent, helping to keep everything from your countertops to showerheads sparkling. And now, thanks to a few very smart scientists, it might be used to help heal wounds.

In September, researchers from the University of Bergen in Norway, QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, and Flinders University in Australia published their findings on ways to “enhance vinegar’s natural antibacterial power,” the team shared in a release.

The team explained that it was able to supercharge vinegar’s antibacterial properties by combining acetic acid — the active component in vinegar, which gives it that signature sour smell and taste — with cobalt-based carbon nanoparticles to produce “cobalt-doped carbon quantum dots.”

What does that actually mean for people? According to the researchers, this “nano-boosted solution” can kill harmful bacteria such as MRSA, E. coli, and Enterococcus faecalis — a bacterium found in wounds that are difficult to heal — while appearing to remain safe for human use.

To reach this conclusion, the team tested the nano-boosted solution on mouse models. They found that in mice with MRSA-infected skin wounds, a single topical dose of the solution reduced bacterial levels by 99.995% within 24 hours. After a week, the wounds showed no detectable MRSA infection.

“Once exposed, the nanoparticles appear to attack dangerous bacteria from both inside the bacterial cell and also on its surface, causing them to burst,” molecular biologists Dr. Adam Truskewycz, and an author of the study, explained in the release. “Importantly, this approach is non-toxic to human cells and was shown to remove bacterial infections from mice wounds without affecting healing.”

This is than just a novel way to treat bacterial infections. The researchers noted in their study that this new solution could help save lives, as “the global fight against antimicrobial resistance… is linked to an estimated 4.5 million infection-related deaths each year.”

They emphasized that there are too few drugs in development to fight antimicrobial resistance, and that most new drugs in this vein are variations on existing antibiotics. In short, they say we need innovative solutions to fight bacterial infections.

The authors, however, added an important caveat in the limitations section of the study, noting that wound healing in mice differs “fundamentally from that in humans.” Although the scientists minimized those differences as much as possible throughout their research, future analyses with animals such as pigs could and should be conducted, as they can closely replicate human skin healing. Regardless, this work is a great start.

“Combination treatments such as the ones highlighted in this study may help to curb antimicrobial resistance,” Professor Nils Halberg, an author on the study, detailed. “Given this issue can kill up to five million people each year, it’s vital we look to find new ways of killing pathogens like viruses, bacteria, and fungi, or parasites.”