Beyond Humans - Virus Therapy for Pathogens of Animals and Plants

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Background

While the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria has prompted renewed interest in phage therapy of human diseases, other researchers have been examining similar approaches to control diseases of animals and plants, as well as the decontamination of foods, animal products and food contact surfaces. These include diseases caused by pathogens other than bacteria, principally fungal pathogens. A more general term for this approach is virus therapy or virotherapy. Virotherapy has been studied and some products developed for treating plant diseases caused by bacteria. Diseases of fish grown in aquaculture have also been studied as potential virotherapy targets. Decontamination of animal- and plant-based food products is an additional area for phage applications. In an interesting variation, virotherapy of some fungal pathogens of certain plants has been studied using hypovirulent viruses, that is, viruses that don’t kill the fungus they infect but rather form a stable infection which reduces the fungal pathogenicity towards its host. In all these cases, the goal is the same - the use of a virus as a treatment or prophylactic agent on an organism infected or susceptible to be infected by the virus’ host.

Phage therapy of human bacterial diseases is very widely written about but fewer studies on diseases of other species are in the literature. This in spite of the fact that phage products for controlling several plant diseases have been marketed for over a decade and products for decontaminating surfaces and foods are also being marketed. In addition there is research and proposals for additional applications of phages and other viruses to numerous other diseases caused by microbes susceptible to virus infection. The goal of this collection is to highlight the use of viruses to treat pathogenic diseases of a variety of animals (excluding humans), plants, and for protecting food.

Original research, review, mini-review, perspective and opinion articles are all welcome. Phage therapy/virotherapy of any pathogenic disease can be the subject except for diseases of humans and models of human diseases. Diseases that infect both humans and animals may be acceptable as long as the focus is on the animal disease rather than the human disease. Food spoilage and food-borne disease may be included as long as the focus is on the treatment of food, not humans infected by the disease. Authors are encouraged to reach out to any of the editors for clarification as to whether a paper would be within the scope of the collection.

Keywords: Virus, Plant pathogen, Animal pathogen, Phage therapy, Virus therapy, Biocontrol

Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.

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