Category: Latest News

Bacteriophage Partnerships: Enhancing Stem Cell Transplant Success

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
Intestinal tissue during a graft-versus-host reaction: Donor cells (red) attack the body of the patient. Credit: Sebastian Jarosch, Dirk Busch / TUM After stem cell transplantation, the donated immune cells sometimes attack the patients’ bodies. This is known as graft versus host disease or GvHD. Researchers at the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and the Universitätsklinikum…

Rapid Bench to Bedside Therapeutic Bacteriophage Production

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
An excellent paper by Luong et al. from San Diego State University has recently been published by Springer on Bacteriophage Therapy: From Lab to Clinical Practice. The comprehensive content of the paper includes: 1. Historical Context: Bacteriophages have been used in human therapeutics for over a century, with significant advancements in production techniques. 2. Modern…

How Bacteria Spot Viral Invasion and Ramp Up Immune Defenses?

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
A viral RNA produced during Φ80α-vir infection activates Ssc-CdnE03 in vitro Researchers at The Rockefeller University’s Laboratory of Bacteriology have uncovered a novel mechanism through which bacteria defend against viral infections, known as the cyclic oligonucleotide-based antiphage signaling system (CBASS). This intricate immune response protects prokaryotes by triggering the production of cyclic oligonucleotides, activating proteins…

Phables: Advancing Phage Research for a Healthier Future

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
Processing workflow. Credits: Flinders Accelerator for Microbiome Exploration, College of Science and Engineering, Flinders University In a significant leap forward for phage research, Flinders University’s College of Science and Engineering introduces “Phables”, a bioinformatics software program designed to address the challenges in identifying and characterizing phage genomes within fragmented viral metagenome assemblies. This innovative tool,…

New Structural Antibiotic Classes Discovered through Explainable Deep Learning

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
In the relentless pursuit of novel solutions to combat the escalating antibiotic resistance crisis, a groundbreaking paper, published in the Nature Journal, reveals a pioneering approach to the discovery of new structural classes of antibiotics. The paper challenges the current status quo in antibiotic discovery by leveraging the power of deep learning. Acknowledging the urgency…

Promising Path for Periprosthetic Hip Infection Recovery: The Power of Phage-Antibiotic Combination Therapy

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
A new Russian study, published in the journal “Viruses”, study delves into the efficacy of combined phage/antibiotic therapy for treating periprosthetic joint infection (PJI) in adult patients with deep PJI of the hip joint. The research, which included 45 adult patients undergoing one-stage revision surgery, presents compelling evidence that could reshape the landscape of PJI…

Sterile Faecal Filtrate Transplantation Shows Promise in Managing Metabolic Syndrome, According to Double-Blind Clinical Trial

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
Overview of the faecal samples used for the bulk metagenomic sequencing (for bacteriome and phageome) and the metagenomic sequencing of the viral-like particles (VLP) A double-blind, randomised, placebo-controlled clinical trial was conducted by a team in The Netherlands in order to assess the efficacy and safety of sterile faecal filtrate transplantation in individuals with metabolic…

Therapeutically useful mycobacteriophages BPs and Muddy require trehalose polyphleates

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
Proposed roles of Pks, PapA3, FadD23, MmpL10 and PE in the synthesis and transport of TPPs and DAT Mycobacteriophages show promise as therapeutic agents for non-tuberculous mycobacterium infections. However, little is known about phage recognition of Mycobacterium cell surfaces or mechanisms of phage resistance. A new study, led by Graham F. Hatfull from the University of Pittsburgh…

Treating bladder infections with viruses

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
The pathogens that cause urinary tract infections are becoming increasingly resistant to antibiotics. ETH Zurich researchers have now developed a rapid test and a new therapeutic approach using bacteria-​infecting viruses known as phages. In brief ETH Zurich researchers have developed a new rapid test that uses bacteriophages – viruses that infect bacteria – to quickly…

Centenarians’ Diverse Gut Virome: Potential to Modulate Metabolism and Promote Healthy Lifespan

Posted on by Targeting Phage Therapy
After last week’s meeting Targeting Phage Therapy 2023 where Prof. Edeas talked about the role of phages in microbiota modulation, this new paper (Nature Microbiology) highlights the richness of the virome and bacteriophages in Centenarians. Johansen et al., from Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, presented a characterization of the centenarian gut virome using previously…