Bacteriophages are small, virus-like organisms that infect bacteria. They are comprised of a protein capsule around an RNA or DNA genome.
Bacteria use a wide range of defense strategies to combat viral infection, and some of these systems have resulted in game-changing technologies like CRISPR-based gene editing.
A new procedure for controlling directed evolution in bacteria is developed and demonstrated by scientists at North Carolina State University.
Mycobacterium abscessus, a relative of the bacteria that cause tuberculosis and leprosy, is responsible for particularly severe damage to human lungs and can be resistant to many standard antibiotics, making infections extremely challenging to treat.
The risk of antibiotic resistance increases as bacteria continue to evade even the most powerful contemporary medicinal treatments. Antibiotic-resistant microorganisms threaten to take more than 10 million lives by 2050, as present-day treatments prove ineffective.
DNA is made up of nucleobases, which are depicted by the letters G, A, T, and C. They are the foundation of the genetic code.
Crop plants and animals can be infected by bacterial pathogens that reduce yield, cause food wastage, and carry human pathogens that spread disease on consumption.
Gene editing for the development of new treatments, and for studying disease as well as normal function in humans and other organisms, may advance more quickly with a new tool for cutting larger pieces of DNA out of a cell's genome, according to a new study by UC San Francisco scientists.
Australian researchers have shown how viruses can be used to save lives, developing the potential use of bacteriophages in bandages to treat life-threatening golden staph infections which may not respond to traditional antibiotics.
A research team from the Severinov Laboratory at Skoltech, together with their collaborators from Israel and Switzerland, has analyzed a bacterial BREX defense mechanism that was poorly studied to date.