Engineered Bacteriophages as Biocontrol Agents Against Foodborne Pathogens

The objective of this research is to bring phages to the forefront of antimicrobials agents against food-borne pathogens. We will develop a broad technology platform for designing customized phages to kill pathogenic microbes using synthetic biology tools. As a proof-of-principle, we will design phages specifically against E. coli O157:H7 which is a enterohemorrhagic strain resident in ruminant animals. The beauty of our approach is that it can be broadly applied to kill other pathogens as well. Engineered phages can also be used for microbiome editing, pathogen detection, gene delivery and biofilm disruption.Aims: 1) To develop a yeast-based system to assemble recombinant phage genomes2) To modulate T7 phage host range by high-throughput tail fiber protein redesign3) To improve efficacy of engineered T7 phages and minimize bacterial resistance