Month: May 2020

Testing the Capacity to Over-Stabilize Viruses by Engineering Mutations into the Capsid of Bacteriophage ɸX174

An effective virus must successfully attach to a receptor on a host cell and inject its genetic material into the cell so that new viruses can be produced. Its ability to infect the host cell is highly dependent on both the binding capability of its capsid proteins as well their ability to modify their conformation …

Experimental Evolution: Identifying Pathways of Viral Resistance

Abstract Phage therapy and antibiotics have been used in treating bacterial infections for nearly a century. However, bacterial mutations over time have allowed bacteria to advance in fitness and, in turn, resistance to these treatments. In this experiment we evolve phage-resistant bacteria to observe the mutations present on a genomic level. Pairing these observations with …