title: Characterization and complete genome sequence of the Shigella bacteriophage pSf-1.
abstract: Shigellosis is a global health problem, and Shigella flexneri is the major cause of this disease. In this study, we isolated a virulent Siphoviridae bacteriophage (phage), pSf-1, that infects S. flexneri. This phage was isolated from the Han River in Korea and was found to infect S. flexneri, Shigella boydii, and Shigella sonnei. One-step growth analysis revealed that this phage has a short latent period (10 min) and a large burst size (86.86 PFU/cell), indicating that pSf-1 has good host infectivity and effective lytic activity. The double-stranded DNA genome of pSf-1 is composed of 51,821 bp with a G + C content of 44.02%. The genome encodes 94 putative ORFs, 71 putative promoters, and 60 transcriptional terminator regions. Genome sequence analysis of pSf-1 and comparative analysis with the homologous Shigella phage Shfl1 revealed that there is a high degree of similarity between pSf-1 and Shfl1 in 54 of the 94 ORFs of pSf-1. The results of this investigation indicate that pSf-1 is a novel Shigella phage and that this phage might have potential uses against shigellosis.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Aquatic Biomedicine, College of Veterinary Medicine and Research Institute for Veterinary Science, Seoul National University, Seoul 151-742, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Jin Woo
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Jun
authors.forename: Ji Hyung
authors.initials: JH
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.forename: Sang Phil
authors.initials: SP
authors.lastname: Shin
authors.forename: Jee Eun
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Han
authors.forename: Ji Young
authors.initials: JY
authors.lastname: Chai
authors.forename: Se Chang
authors.initials: SC
authors.lastname: Park
mesh_terms: D001435:Bacteriophages / Q000235:genetics* / Q000254:growth & development / Q000302:isolation & purification; D004279:DNA, Viral / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics*; D016679:Genome, Viral; D007723:Korea; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D016366:Open Reading Frames; D011401:Promoter Regions, Genetic; D045483:Rivers / Q000821:virology; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D017385:Sequence Homology; D012760:Shigella / Q000821:virology*; D017906:Siphoviridae / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification; D026801:Synteny; D013728:Terminator Regions, Genetic
chemical_list: D004279:DNA, Viral
keywords: Bacteriophage; Shigella flexneri; Shigellosis; Siphoviridae; pSf-1