SELF-ORGANIZATION IN VIRUSES FORMATION: THE NANO-PROCESS OF ASSEMBLING HEADS (CAPSIDS) AND LAYING DNA ON THE EXAMPLE OF TAILED BACTERIOPHAGES (LAMBDA, T4)

Abstract

The relevance of the problem. The widespread and uncontrolled use of antibacterial drugs not only in medicine, but also in agriculture, animal husbandry, and the food industry has led to the spread of multi-resistant strains resistant to the most common antibacterial drugs. In search of alternative strategies for the prevention and control of bacterial infection, attention is increasingly being paid to bacteriophage (phage) therapy. With a wide range of genetic engineering capabilities, these bacterial viruses can be modified to achieve precise control and detection of bacteria and thus serve as a new source of antimicrobial agents. In addition to being used in antimicrobial therapy, phages can also be used as transport systems for drug delivery, as vaccines, or can be used for nanosembly of new materials, since phages themselves, their fragments and components are nanoobjects and functioning nanomachines, the assembly process of which is extremely relevant. The purpose of this article is: to analyze and summarize the most important information on the topic of bacteriophages, methods of their determination and effective transformation in modern science, to evaluate the achievements of modern research in the process of assembling heads (capsids) and laying intracapsid DNA in caudate bacteriophages (phage lambda and phage T4), the production of genetically modified phages and a review of the main prospects for the development of this direction.