Understanding microbiological warfare between bacteria and bacteriophages

Bacteria are under selection pressure from infection by viruses called bacteriophages. As a result, bacteria have evolved diverse systems to defend against phages. In response, phages have evolved counter defenses. This back and forth has generated many useful biotechnological tools including restriction enzymes and Cas9 genome editing tools.

We are characterizing the activity and regulation of a range of bacterial phage defense systems, including Bacteriophage Exclusion (BREX) that protects the host by targeted methylation whilst restricting phage growth by an as yet unknown mechanism.