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Structural model at atomic resolution of bacteriophage T4 [1] The structure of a typical myovirus bacteriophage Anatomy and infection cycle of bacteriophage T4.. A bacteriophage (/ b æ k ˈ t ɪər i oʊ f eɪ dʒ /), also known informally as a phage (/ ˈ f eɪ dʒ /), is a virus that infects and replicates within bacteria and archaea.
Phage injecting its genome into bacterial cell An electron micrograph of bacteriophages attached to a bacterial cell. These viruses are the size and shape of coliphage T1. Phage therapy, viral phage therapy, or phagotherapy is the therapeutic use of bacteriophages for the treatment of pathogenic bacterial infections.
The basic experimental toolkit of phage "organismal" ecology consists of the single-step growth (or one-step growth; [12]) experiment and the phage adsorption curve. [13] Single-step growth is a means of determining the phage latent period ( example ), which is approximately equivalent (depending on how it is defined) to the phage period of ...
Most of these viruses are bacteriophages which infect and destroy marine bacteria and control the growth of phytoplankton at the base of the marine food web. Bacteriophages are harmless to plants and animals but are essential to the regulation of marine ecosystems. They supply key mechanisms for recycling ocean carbon and nutrients.
Several bacteriophages contain toxin genes that become incorporated into the host bacteria genome through infection and render the bacteria toxic. [9] Many well known bacterial toxins are produced from specific strains of the bacteria species that have obtained toxigenicity through lysogenic conversion, pseudolysogeny, or horizontal gene ...
During 1962-1964 phage T4 researchers provided an opportunity to study the function of virtually all of the genes that are essential for growth of the phage under laboratory conditions. [43] [44] These studies were facilitated by the discovery of two classes of conditional lethal mutants. One class of such mutants is known as amber mutants. [45]
In the lytic cycle, the virus commandeers the cell's reproductive machinery. The cell may fill with new viruses until it lyses or bursts, or it may release the new viruses one at a time in an exocytotic process. The period from infection to lysis is termed the latent period. A virus following a lytic cycle is called a virulent virus.
A more detailed account of the use of phage in major biological discoveries can be found on the page, bacteriophage. As one of the earliest applied microbiologists, d'Hérelle's microbe-centered worldview has been noted for its prescience, since microbes are playing increasingly important roles in bioremediation, microbial fuel cells, gene ...