Viruses infecting the bacteria, called bacteriophage (phage), are the most important abundant biological entity in the earth. They have been used for over 90 years as an alternative to antibiotics in the former Soviet Union, east Europe and France. They are currently being tried as a possible therapy against multi-drug-resistant strains of many bacteria.
We are looking for potential application of bacteriophages and their parts (phage lysins) or recombinant bacterial cell wall hydrolases (Mishra, Nair, et al., 2013) in treating infections. Currently we are targeting gut (enteric) pathogens in waste water. Gut pathogens may include virus (Rotavirus), bacteria (Vibrio cholerae, Shilgella, E. coli, Staphylococcus aureus), protists (Giardia, Entamoeba) and helminths (Ascaris, Hymenolepis, Trichuris). We are isolating bacteriophages from different waste water ecosystems and testing their efficacy on quick disinfection of the waste water. Specific interest is to design appropriate safe lytics broadcasting system (LBS) which will be cost effective and simple to be used for public sanitation program. Further, we are exploring other biocontrol agents (bacterial & fungal hydrolases, natural products from plants) which will be potentially cost-effective lytic agents against infection for sanitation purposes.