Recent Advances in Therapeutic Delivery Systems of Bacteriophage and Bacteriophage-Encoded Endolysins

Abstract

Antibiotics have been the cornerstone of clinical management of bacterial infection since their discovery in the early 20th century. However, their widespread and often indiscriminate use has now led to reports of multidrug resistance becoming globally commonplace. Bacteriophage therapy has undergone a recent revival in battle against pathogenic bacteria, as the self-replicating and co-evolutionary features of these predatory virions offer several advantages over conventional therapeutic agents. In particular, the use of targeted bacteriophage therapy from specialized delivery platforms has shown particular promise owing to the control of delivery location, administration conditions and dosage of the therapeutic cargo. This review presents an overview of the recent formulations and applications of such delivery vehicles as an innovative and elegant tool for bacterial control.

Bacteriophage Therapy: Recent Development and Applications

“…Besides implementing the entire bacteriophage as a substitute for typical antibiotics, there has been a contemporary advancement in utilizing the phages and phage-acquired products, explicitly endolysins as antimicrobial agents [93,94]. These proteins frequently comprehend enzymatic integrants that include virionassociated peptidoglycan hydrolases, also designated as lytic structural proteins that destroy the bacterial cell wall peptidoglycans, thus enabling the penetration of phage DNA at the origination of the infection.…”

The Promise of viral phage therapy in hernia mesh infection, is this the biological ‘silver bullet’ of the future?

“…Phages have been successfully immobilized by numerous means onto a variety of solid substrates, 28–31 and their immobilization onto surgical mesh is technically feasible. Immobilization of phages onto mesh would endow it with anti‐microbial properties specifically against the phage's target species.…”

Enhancing Whole Phage Therapy and Their Derived Antimicrobial Enzymes through Complex Formulation

“…Any final formulation involving whole phages, phage-derived antimicrobial enzymes, and adjunct components will have to consider the intended application. How such therapeutics are stored and delivered could influence the potential shelf life, persistence in vivo , and the overall efficacy of the phage and non-phage adjuncts [ 13 , 181 , 182 ]. Although clinical and non-clinical applications share some of the same requirements for storage and delivery (e.g., long shelf life at ambient temperatures), which would enable research to be carried out more effectively, it is likely that each treatment area will possess unique requirements.…”