Bacterial Immunity Against Bacteriophage by Killing Infected Bacteria.

We've all heard of human sacrifice, but few have heard of bacterial sacrifice. Bacteria like Escherichia coli can save others by self-destructing E. coli cells infected with bacteriophage.

A groundbreaking research published in Molecular Cell on January 10, 2020 revealed that CBASS is a bacterial anti-bacteriophage treatment that kills infected bacterial cells in a mechanism similar to abortive infection.


Peptide sensing through the HORMA protein activates the E. coli CBASS anti-phage pathway. CBASS activation causes the creation of a messenger, which activates a nuclease enzyme, causing the bacterial genome to be destroyed and infected cells to be killed.

The significance of this finding lies not only in detecting bacterial immunity to bacteriophage, but also in purposely introducing CBASS into multidrug resistant bacteria to destroy them.

References:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1097276519309220?via%3Dihub

https://www.labroots.com/trending/cell-and-molecular-biology/16561/save-others-bacteria-self-destruct-infected-virus

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