Tackling Antibiotic Resistance: Viruses to the Rescue

Working with bacteriophages and nematodes, the University of California, Berkeley, molecular biologist uncovered a role for genetic switches in early development.

Researchers suggest the viruses can help endosymbiotic bacteria get along with their hosts.

Metabolic disrupters, phages, and other approaches are going to be needed to treat the broadest possible range of patients infected by bacterial pathogens resistant to multiple drugs.

Tweaking the genomes of two phages and combining them with a third phage helped to clear a persistent Mycobacterium infection in the patient.

The findings more than double the number of known defense mechanisms, piquing the interests of molecular biology tool developers.

Researchers reconstruct images of a virus that infects Escherichia coli bacteria.

Phage therapy is but one example of using biological entities to reduce our reliance on antibiotics and other failing chemical solutions.

In Chapter 3, “The Enemy of Our Enemy Is Our Friend: Infecting the Infection,” author Emily Monosson makes the case for bacteriophage therapy in the treatment of infectious disease.