Phage spies

Justin Silpe and Bonnie Bassler discovered that a Vibrio cholerae phage senses its host’s quorum sensing molecules and lyses only when enough hosts are present in the surrounding area. By engineering this system, they got phages to lyse in response to user-defined cues, which has intriguing implications for phage therapy. Read also Ed Yong’s story on this exciting work in The Atlantic.