Tail-Engineered Phage P2 for Antimicrobials Delivery

 

 

Bacteriophages can be reprogrammed to deliver antimicrobials for therapeutic and biocontrol purposes and are a promising alternative treatment to antimicrobial-resistant bacteria.

Fa-arun et al. developed a bacteriophage P4 cosmid system for the delivery of a Cas9 antimicrobial into clinically relevant human gut pathogens Shigella flexneri and Escherichia coli O157:H7.  Their P4 cosmid design produces a high titer of cosmid-transducing units without contamination by a helper phage.

Further, they demonstrate that genetic engineering of the phage tail fiber improves the transduction efficiency of cosmid DNA in S. flexneri M90T as well as allows recognition of a nonnative host, E. coli O157:H7. They showed that the transducing units with the chimeric tails enhanced the overall Cas9-mediated killing of both pathogens. 

In summary, this study demonstrates the potential of our P4 cas9 cosmid system as a DNA sequence-specific antimicrobial against clinically relevant gut pathogenic bacteria.

Article DOI.

Image Credits: Fa-arun et al., ACS Synthetic Biology 2023


Targeting Phage Therapy will introduce the latest applications of bacteriophages. A whole session will be dedicated to phage therapy innovations. Full Program.

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Targeting Phage Therapy 2023 Congress
6th World Conference
June 1-2, 2023 – Paris, France