Reinventing the fight against bacteria, one phage at a time.

Study Advances Understanding of Immune System’s Crucial Role in Phage Therapy A new study co-authored by University of Maryland biologist Joshua Weitz assessed the potential for phage therapy to help treat antibiotic-resistant pneumonia. As antibiotic-resistant “superbugs” make infections trickier to treat, some in the medical community are turning to bacteriophages for backup. Also known as phages, these viruses exclusively target bacteria, allowing them to tackle bacterial infections when introduced to a patient’s body.  Phages (green) are shown engulfed by alveolar macrophages (cytoskeleton in pink and nucleus in blue). Image courtesy of Laurent Debarbieux and Solène Ecomard of the Institut Pasteur. While the use of phage therapy as an alternative or complementary treatment to antibiotics is growing, much is still unknown about how these viruses interact with bacteria and the immune system. A new study jointly led by the teams of  Joshua Weitz  at the University o...

The Paradox of Rapid Adaptation in Double-Stranded DNA Phages Despite Low Mutation Rates The evolutionary arms race between bacteriophages and their bacterial hosts has long fascinated microbiologists due to the remarkable speed at which phages can adapt to bacterial defenses. Double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) phages, in particular, present an intriguing paradox. Unlike many RNA viruses and single-stranded DNA viruses characterized by notoriously high mutation rates, dsDNA phages typically exhibit relatively low mutation rates—on the order of 10⁻⁸ to 10⁻⁶ mutations per nucleotide per replication cycle—comparable to or only slightly higher than their bacterial hosts. Yet, despite these low per-nucleotide mutation rates, dsDNA phages demonstrate an extraordinary capacity to rapidly adapt and evolve in response to bacterial countermeasures. This review explores the mechanisms underpinning this rapid evolutionary adaptability, with a focus on population dynamics, genomic architecture, recombina...

Researchers enlist the public as citizen scientists at national exhibition Investigating bacterial samples taken from cystic fibrosis patients Researchers at the University of Southampton are asking the public to become citizen scientists in the fight against antibiotic resistance. At the  Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition  , which opens to the public on Wednesday 2 July in London, visitors will be invited to help find phages – tiny viruses that could be key to combating antimicrobial resistance (AMR). At their exhibit, the Southampton scientists will ask people to collect and send water samples from their homes, local parks or rivers, or even their toilets. These samples will be analysed by researchers on the hunt for phages that could help fight resistant bacterial infections. The World Health Organization identifies AMR as one of the top global public health threats, estimated in 20221 to be directly responsible for over one million global deaths per year, and contrib...