Get the latest tech news

Crispr-Enhanced Viruses Are Being Deployed Against UTIs


With antibiotics losing their effectiveness, one company is turning to gene editing and bacteriophages—viruses that infect bacteria—to combat infections.

The global rise in antibiotic resistance is making bacterial infections harder to treat and increasing the risk of disease spread, severe illness, and death. Often used in cases of chronic or life-threatening infections when antibiotics fail, scientists comb through collections of phages searching for ones that best match the problematic bacteria living inside a patient. Once inside their target cells, these phages use the Crispr system to home in on a crucial site in the E. coli genome and start degrading the bacteria’s DNA.

Get the Android app

Or read this on Wired

Read more on:

Photo of utis

utis

Photo of enhanced viruses

enhanced viruses