The Learning Curve Meets the Growth Curve: Phage in the classroom

GAUTAM DUTTA, NAOMI HOLYE, RAUL RAYA, ANDREW BRABBAN, ELIZABETH KUTTER

Atlanta, Georgia, USA

Congreso; 2005 General Meeting American Society for Microbiology; 2005

American Society for Microbiology, USA

Bacteriophages have played an integral role in the development of modern genetics, molecular biology, viral morphogenesis, and, now, in the resurgence of phage therapy. In a time when antibiotic resistance has become a major cause of disease and death, phages offer an old solution to this new challenge, bringing new excitement to help students learn basic science and pull together ideas and concepts from many subject areas to tackle real-world issues in all their complexity. The Evergreen approach to science and education provides opportunities to apply theoretical knowledge gained in the classroom to ongoing group oriented research projects with wide-reaching implications, whether students are headed toward public policy, K-12 teaching, research or the health professions. We currently have four ongoing projects: (1)A collaboration with partners in the Republic of Georgia to do molecular characterization of phages to be used in therapeutic cocktails against Pseudomonas aeruginosa in wounds and burns from natural and unnatural disasters (supported by the Civilian Research and Development Foundation. (2)Acollaboration with the USDA in Texas to isolate phages highly effective against Escherichia coli O157 and study their genomics and anaerobic/aerobic infection kinetics (3)A collaboration with the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission to isolate and characterize phages against Aeromonas salmoncida the causative agent of Furunculosis in salmonids, which will then be tested in salmon at a high school in Aberdeen in collaboration with two Murdock fellow high school teachers. (4)A study of aspects of phage morphogenesis that seem relevant to phage infection under some environmental conditions. Many students enter the lab with little working knowledge of microbiology, molecular biology, or host-pathogen interactions, but become stimulated through the many new questions and concepts that can be explored relatively easily and inexpensively with phages, and we have scores of extraordinary results and excited students to show from the process. Our hope is that phages will once again become one of the standard tools of the science educator.