Advance on Engineering of Bacteriophages by Synthetic Biology

Abstract

Qingqing Sun,1,* Lixin Shen,1,* Bai-Ling Zhang,2 Jiaoyang Yu,1,3 Fu Wei,1 Yanmei Sun,1 Wei Chen,3,4 Shiwei Wang1 1Key Laboratory of Resources Biology and Biotechnology in Western China, Ministry of Education, Provincial Key Laboratory of Biotechnology of Shaanxi Province, the College of Life Sciences, Northwest University, Xi’an, 710069, People’s Republic of China; 2Department of Laboratory Medicine, The Second Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University, Nanchang, 330006, People’s Republic of China; 3Clinical Research Center, the Second Hospital of Nanjing, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Nanjing, 210003, People’s Republic of China; 4The Clinical Infectious Disease Center of Nanjing, Nanjing, 210003, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Wei Chen; Shiwei Wang, Email [email protected]; [email protected]: Since bacteriophages (phages) were firstly reported at the beginning of the 20th century, the study on them experiences booming-fading-emerging with discovery and overuse of antibiotics. Although they are the hotspots for therapy of antibiotic-resistant strains nowadays, natural phage applications encounter some challenges such as limited host range and bacterial resistance to phages. Synthetic biology, one of the most dramatic directions in the recent 20-years study of microbiology, has generated numerous methods and tools and has contributed a lot to understanding phage evolution, engineering modification, and controlling phage-bacteria interactions. In order to better modify and apply phages by using synthetic biology techniques in the future, in this review, we comprehensively introduce various strategies on engineering or modification of phage genome and rebooting of recombinant phages, summarize the recent researches and potential directions of phage synthetic biology, and outline the current application of engineered phages in practice.Keywords: phage, synthetic biology, engineering, rebooting, phage therapy, phage application

Keywords

• phage
• synthetic biology
• engineering
• rebooting
• phage therapy
• phage application