Combatting intracellular pathogens using bacteriophage delivery

Abstract

Intracellular pathogens reside in specialised compartments within the host cells restricting the access of antibiotics. Insufficient intracellular delivery of antibiotics along with several other resistance mechanisms weaken the efficacy of current therapies. An alternative to antibiotic therapy could be bacteriophage (phage) therapy. Although phage therapy has been in practice for a century against various bacterial infections, the efficacy of phages against intracellular bacteria is still being explored. In this review, we will discuss the advancement and challenges in phage therapy, particularly against intracellular bacterial pathogens. Finally, we will highlight the uptake mechanisms and approaches to overcome the challenges to phage therapy against intracellular bacteria.

Keywords:

• Antibiotic resistance
• phage uptake
• intracellular phage delivery
• particle engineering

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge all members of Drug Delivery Laboratory at Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, for their input regarding the clarity and editing of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Additional information

Funding

Rachit Agarwal acknowledges the funding received from Ramanujan fellowship [SB/S2/RJN-036/2017, Department of Science and Technology, India], Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore and Mr. Lakshmi Narayanan. Financial support by Department of Biotechnology (DBT-Research Associate), India and Science and Engineering Research Board, Department of Science and Technology [N-PDF, PDF/2020/000290], India to Avijit Goswami is also acknowledged. Pallavi Raj Sharma acknowledges fellowship support from Department of Biotechnology, India [DBT-JRF, DBT/2017/IISc/941].