What is Fire Blight?

Fire blight is highly contagious and difficult to control causing hundreds of acres to be cut down and burned.

Cankers are formed which allow bacteria to survive a winter till the next spring when flowers bloom.

Phage Therapy

As antibiotics have been used increasingly over the past century, resistance to these life-saving medicines grows exponentially. Phage therapy offers an exciting alternative.

Our Plan

Using phage Φ Ea104, we will optimize the phage to attack the fire blight bacteria.

Then we will delete an essential gene to ensure the phage does not attack other microbes in the environment.