Drugs against superbugs: private lessons from bacteriophages

Bacterial genomics has provided a plethora of potential targets for antibacterial drug discovery, however, success in the hunt for new antibiotics will hinge on selecting targets with the highest potential. A recent paper by Liu and coworkers describes a new approach to target selection that uncovers strategies used by bacteriophage to disable bacteria. The method uses key phage proteins to identify and validate vulnerable targets and exploits …