ABSTRACT
Fire blight, caused by plant pathogenic bacterium Erwinia amylovora, is one of the most important diseases of Rosaceae plants. Due to the lack of effective control measures, fire blight infections pose a recurrent threat on agricultural production worldwide. Recently, bacterial viruses, or bacteriophages, have been proposed as environmentally friendly natural antimicrobial agents for fire blight control. Here, we isolated a novel bacteriophage Hena1 with activity against E. amylovora. Further analysis revealed that Hena1 is a narrow-host-range lytic phage belonging to Myoviridae family. Its genome consists of a linear 148,842 bp dsDNA (48.42% GC content) encoding 240 ORFs and 23 tRNA genes. Based on virion structure and genomic composition, Hena1 was classified as a new species of bacteriophage subfamily Vequintavirinae. The comprehensive analysis of Hena1 genome may provide further insights into evolution of bacteriophages infecting plant pathogenic bacteria.
Subject(s)
Erwinia amylovora/virology , Genome, Viral , Myoviridae/classification , DNA, Viral/genetics , Erwinia amylovora/genetics , Host Specificity , Microscopy, Electron , Myoviridae/isolation & purification , Myoviridae/ultrastructure , Open Reading Frames/genetics , Phylogeny , Plant Diseases/microbiology , Rosaceae/microbiology , Sequence Analysis, DNA , Virion/geneticsABSTRACT
RB43-related bacteriophages have a specific genome type that clearly distinguishes them from other T4-like viruses. Here, we present the complete genome sequence of a new virulent phage, Lw1, isolated as an Escherichia coli BL21(DE3) contaminant. Lw1 shares an RB43-like genome organization, but it does not contain putative AP2-domain endonuclease genes.
