Predictive phage therapy for MDR E. coli infections

Phage therapy is the use of free-living bacterial viruses (phages) to treat bacterial infections. Phage therapy is undergoing a resurgence as a result of the urgent need to find ways to treat multi-drug resistant (MDR) bacterial infections, including bacteria that develop inherent defense against antibiotics after repeated exposure. Our group is applying machine-learning approaches to select optimum phage combinations based on analysis of isolate genome sequences and accumulated data on phage activity. This project will contribute to this work by isolating new phages that kill MDR E. coli and using a high throughput screen to test them on a collection of MDR E. coli isolates from human infections.