A Review of Phage Therapy against Bacterial Pathogens of Aquatic and Terrestrial Organisms

Abstract

Since the discovery of bacteriophage in the early 1900s, there have been numerous attempts to exploit their innate ability to kill bacteria. The purpose of this report is to review current findings and new developments in phage therapy with an emphasis on bacterial diseases of marine organisms, humans, and plants. The body of evidence includes data from studies investigating bacteriophage in marine and land environments as modern antimicrobial agents against harmful bacteria. The goal of this paper is to present an overview of the topic of phage therapy, the use of phage-derived protein therapy, and the hosts that bacteriophage are currently being used against, with an emphasis on the uses of bacteriophage against marine, human, animal and plant pathogens.

Keywords: Vibrio phage; aquaculture; bacteriophage; phage therapy.

Figure 1

The anatomy of a tailed bacteriophage of the order Caudovirales.

Figure 2

The phage life cycle. Lytic phage go through the lytic cycle, in which the host is lysed and progeny phage are released into the environment. Temperate phage can go through the lytic or the lysogenic cycle. Some phage rely on small molecules to communicate and execute lysis–lysogeny decisions [8]. In the lysogenic cycle, the phage genome is incorporated into the host genome; this phage DNA—now called a prophage—can be induced, leading to the expression of phage DNA and the lytic cycle.