Synthetic bioparticles as deadly bacterial assassins: a solution to antibiotic resistant superviruses?
Researchers from MIT and Harvard have developed a a new method of destroying harmful bacteria using “phagemids,” synthetic particles designed to act like viruses.
Credit: Christine Daniloff and Jose-Luis Olivares/MIT (plasmid illustration courtesy of the researchers)
In a paper published this month in Nano Letters, the team led by James Collins, the Termeer Professor of Medical Engineering and Science at MIT, describe a novel technique for engineering bacterial phagemids that disrupt the intracellular processes in targeted bacteria by infecting it with small DNA molecules, which then replicate and emit toxic proteins or peptides that ultimately destroy the host cell.