Therapy Potential of Tailless Bacteriophage ΦHN161 and its Ability in Modulating Inflammation Caused by Bacterial Disease

Qingqing Chai, Dandan Wu, Fan Liu, Fei Song, Xibiao Tang, Yun Cao and Qigai He*

Therapy Potential of Tailless Bacteriophage ΦHN161 and its Ability in Modulating Inflammation Caused by Bacterial Disease.

The World Health Organization estimates that 5 million children die of acute diarrhea each year.
E. coli strains of different serotypes continue to be among the most widely spread pathogens
that trigger diarrhea in humans and animals. Among these various E. coli serotypes, the E. coli
O161 is becoming an increasingly deleterious etiology as abuse of large number of antibiotics.
Among all the phages collected, electron microscopy revealed that phage φHN161 particle was tailless, its capsid was round, and the isometric capsid had a diameter of 40 nm (Figure 1). The genome formed a tightly packed coil in some phage particles, while phage φHN161 in other phases showed empty core.

Although phage φHN161 at different doses eliminated all the E. coli O161 in vivo, only lower dose
of phage treatment can drastically reduce inflammation cause by E. coli O161 infection, while treatment of higher dose of phage concurrently with E. coli O161 induced inflammation. The mean concentration of the inflammatory cytokine IL-1β in group one was 47.674±41.421 pg/ml after 10 days, while the mean concentration of IL-1β in group five was 5.408±3.410 pg/ml after 10 days (Figure 4). This reduction of IL-1β in group five was significantly different from that of the group one (p<0.005).

The results obtained in this report are remarkable: just one single phage φHN161 injection is sufficient for effective recovery. That is to say, before the phage φHN161 is cleared by immune system, all the host pathogens have been eradicated. Furthermore, it is encouraging to administer a cocktail of similar phages with strong lysing ability in commercial production.

Vet Med Open J. 2016; 1(2): 36- 42. doi: 10.17140/VMOJ-1-107