AUTHOR=Sharma Ruchira , Pielstick Brittany A. , Bell Kimberly A. , Nieman Tanner B. , Stubbs Olivia A. , Yeates Edward L. , Baltrus David A. , Grose Julianne H. 

TITLE=A Novel, Highly Related Jumbo Family of Bacteriophages That Were Isolated Against Erwinia

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Microbiology

VOLUME=10

YEAR=2019

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/microbiology/articles/10.3389/fmicb.2019.01533

DOI=10.3389/fmicb.2019.01533

ISSN=1664-302X

ABSTRACT=<p><italic>Erwinia amylovora</italic> is a plant pathogen from the <italic>Erwiniaceae</italic> family and a causative agent of the devastating agricultural disease fire blight. Here we characterize eight lytic bacteriophages of <italic>E. amylovora</italic> that we isolated from the Wasatch front (Utah, United States) that are highly similar to vB_EamM_Ea35-70 which was isolated in Ontario, Canada. With the genome size ranging from 271 to 275 kb, this is a novel jumbo family of bacteriophages. These jumbo bacteriophages were further characterized through genomic and proteomic comparison, mass spectrometry, host range and burst size. Their proteomes are highly unstudied, with over 200 putative proteins with no known homologs. The production of 27 of these putative proteins was confirmed by mass spectrometry analysis. These bacteriophages appear to be most similar to bacteriophages that infect <italic>Pseudomonas</italic> and <italic>Ralstonia</italic> rather than <italic>Enterobacteriales</italic> bacteria by protein similarity, however, we were only able to detect infection of <italic>Erwinia</italic> and the closely related strains of <italic>Pantoea</italic>.</p>