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ABSTRACT:

Bacteriophages, or phages, are viruses that infect and kill a host bacterium. Phages are often very specific to the type of bacteria they infect, although one bacterium could be susceptible to multiple phages. Numerous phages have been discovered and studied, such as those targeting bacterial species of the phylum Actinomycetota, but many millions remain undiscovered. With today’s rising antibiotic resistance crisis, discovering and studying new phages is more important than ever, as they are anti-bacterial agents. The goal of this research was to discover novel phages that infect different types of water bacteria and to provide a functional annotation of their genomes. 

Water samples were collected from five different swamps in New Hampshire. One bacterium was isolated and cultured from each sample. Phage isolation attempts were made for each bacterium with all five original water samples, using direct isolation techniques outlined by the Science Education Alliance-Phage Hunters Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science (SEA-PHAGES) program. These attempts resulted in the successful discovery of one phage, which was named Northmill after the location at which it was found. This phage only infected one of the five bacterial strains that had been isolated. Both the host bacterium and the phage were sequenced by SeqCoast Genomics using Illumina short-read sequencing. Northmill was found to infect the bacterium Serratia fonticola. Genomic analysis and functional annotation of Northmill using various bioinformatics tools demonstrated similarity to Erwinia phages, with no similar Serratia phages reported. The discovery of Northmill illustrates a method in which phages can be discovered and characterized, expanding our understanding of natural phage diversity and opening the door to further exploration of biomedical phage applications. 

POSTER

This research was conducted in the microbiology lab at the UNHM campus from summer 2025 through spring 2026. Many thanks to Dr. Kyle MacLea for all of his guidance and to NH INBRE for providing funding to the lab.

Author and Mentor Bios

Originally from the small town of Springfield, NH, Anya currently lives in Manchester, NH, with her cat Zoe. She is a biotechnology major at the Â鶹app at Manchester (UNHM) and is working toward a master’s degree in biotechnology. Anya’s goal is to pursue medical school, and she is taking advantage of the opportunity to learn all she can at UNHM to prepare herself for that journey.

Kyle MacLea is an associate professor of biological sciences and biotechnology at UNH Manchester where he teaches courses in the areas of molecular biology and microbiology. His research interests include microbial genetics and genomics, particularly of bacteria, archaea, and bacteriophages.