T7 Production in Escherichia coli B23 Is Not Inhibited By ΦX-174 at a Multiplicity of Infection of 10

Abstract

Understanding molecular interactions between bacteriophages in a co-infection is important for predicting progeny production which is used as an indicator of bacteriophage success in an infection ΦX-174 and T7 are Escherichia coli bacteriophages that both use lipopolysaccharide as a receptor for adsorption and entry. In this study, both T7 and ΦX-174 were shown to bind to Escherichia coli B23, however only T7 produced progeny in this host. Given this distinction, we asked if ΦX-174 at a multiplicity of infection of 10 is sufficient to inhibit T7 progeny production during sequential co-infection of Escherichia coli strain B23. Our data indicated that ΦX-174 bacteriophage at a multiplicity of infection of 10 is insufficient to inhibit T7 bacteriophage progeny production in Escherichia coli B23. This demonstrates that ΦX-174 does not interfere with T7 adsorption, even though they share the same host cell receptor.