The mysterious DNA sequences appear to help bacterial cells spot when they’ve been infected with viruses—and prompt those cells to self-destruct.

The gastrointestinal tracts of people with major depressive disorder harbor a signature composition of viruses, bacteria, and their metabolic products, according to the most comprehensive genomic and metabolomic analysis in depression to date.

Researchers Jason Gill and Paul Turner will discuss their work on bacteriophage therapy to treat drug resistant bacterial infections.

Working with a virus that infects bacteria, the Stanford University biochemist and developmental biologist helped to develop a way to stitch DNA together, a discovery that gave rise to genetic engineering.

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.

AcrIIA4, an inhibitor protein from the Listeria bacteriophage, can block DNA from binding to Cas9 during genome editing.

When engineered to use a four-billion-year-old version of the protein thioredoxin, the bacteria can stall bacteriophage replication, a new study shows.

Viruses within Salmonella rapidly spread genes throughout the bacterial population during a gut infection, scientists show.

A team finds that viruses can sense chemical signals and use them to decide whether to kill or infect their hosts.

In bacteriophage genomes, researchers find three anti-CRISPR proteins that naturally inhibit CRISPR-Cas9 in one bacterial species and can do the same in human cells. 

Researchers find evidence of antibiotic resistance genes in the DNA of viruses that infect bacteria.