Systematic discovery of bacterial anti-phage systems through a protein domain-centric strategy - PubMed
4 hours ago
- #phage defense
- #bacterial immunity
- #genomics
- Bacterial anti-phage systems are modular, allowing for systematic discovery by searching for operons with known defensive domains in non-canonical configurations.
- In Escherichia coli genomes, 39,848 candidate defense operons were identified, representing variants of 82 defense families, with nine experimentally tested and six validated as having anti-phage activity.
- Notable findings include DarTG and ietAS system variants acquiring helicase modules, a Gabija system with a MazF-like protein replacing GajA, and a new Pycsar clade synergizing with type IV Thoeris to broaden phage protection.