Phage Templating of Nanoparticles, Proteins, and Biologically Relevant Molecules

We examine the utility of a bio‐panning technique to isolate unharnessed and potentially yet‐unidentified marine bacteriophage that may be able to play a role in the development of useful nanoparticle architectures for applications as diverse as nanoparticle‐based solar cells, nanosensors, to their use as antimicrobials. The most pressing bottleneck in the field is the tediousness of assembling nanoparticles at scales as small as a millionth or a billionth of a meter, however phage templating for the patterning of nanoparticles is proving to be a powerful way to overcome this problem. Marine and freshwater ecosystems hold the highest concentration of unidentified bacteriophage on the planet and we predict that tapping in to this unharnessed pool of phage will result in the discovery of a variety of novel phage‐nanoparticle interactions. To date, marine and freshwater phage have been successfully pooled and concentrated by polyethylene glycol (PEG) and iron chloride (FeCl3) precipitation, followed by low speed centrifugation in our laboratory. These pooled phage concentrates are currently under evaluation with ‘smart bio‐panning & propagation’ to identify varying phage‐nanoparticle interaction strengths. Isolated phage are genotyped via shotgun sequencing and categorized by nanoparticle interaction with the intention of developing a first of its kind library of unique phage‐nanoparticle interactions that may hold promise in advancing nanoscience research requirements of the future. Support or Funding Information Sponsor: Dr. Sandra Clement Cal Poly State University Biology Dept. 1 Grand Av San Luis Obispo, CA 93407