Phage DisCo: targeted discovery of bacteriophages by co-culture (mSystems)

Rand and colleagues present Phage DisCo (phage discovery by co-culture) in mSystems: bacterial strains that are isogenic except for fluorescent tags and one perturbation expected to affect phage infection are co-cultured on the same screening plate, so differential plaquing, visible by fluorescence, implies the perturbation prevents infection. They validate the method with characterized phages and show it can target phages from receptors to phage defence systems, without isolating and characterizing many redundant phages.