title: Using the rate of respiration to monitor events in the infection of Escherichia coli cultures by bacteriophage T4.
abstract: The growing interest in applications of bacteriophages creates a need for improvements in the production processes. Continuous monitoring of the phage production is an essential aspect of any control strategy and, at present, there is no completely satisfactory option. The approach presented here uses IR-spectrometry to continuously measure the rate of respiration (CO(2) released) of Escherichia coli infected by phage T4 at various multiplicities of infection (MOI). Within the trends in these data, or in other aspects of the rate of respiration, it was possible to reliably and reproducibly identify five features that reflected specific events in the infection process. These included two events in the host cell apparent growth rate and events in the magnitude of the host cell density, in the measurement of OD(600) or in the specific rate of respiration. All of these correlations were within 95% confidence showing that they are suitable for the monitoring and control of E. coli populations infected by phage T4. This method is reliable, cheap, and can be operated in-line and in real time.
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Chemical Engineering, McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada H3A 2B2.
authors.forename: Dominic
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Sauvageau
authors.forename: Béatrice
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Allain
authors.forename: David G
authors.initials: DG
authors.lastname: Cooper
mesh_terms: D017122:Bacteriophage T4 / Q000502:physiology*; D019149:Bioreactors; D002245:Carbon Dioxide / Q000378:metabolism*; D049109:Cell Proliferation; D004926:Escherichia coli / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000821:virology*; D005285:Fermentation; D013055:Spectrophotometry, Infrared; D014169:Transformation, Bacterial
chemical_list: D002245:Carbon Dioxide