Friendly viruses could speed up pollution clean-up, study finds

Scientists in Australia say that ‘friendly’ viruses can improve the ability of bacteria to remove pollutants from soil, water, mining waste and other environments, offering a promising new tool for environmental remediation efforts.

A research team led by Flinders University in Australia said that phage virus ‘bioaugmentation’ offers a promising new direction for environmental biotechnology, harnessing the ecological role of lysogenic phages to enhance microbial breakdown of contaminants, according to a university statement released on Tuesday.

The researchers propose using lysogenic bacteriophages, viruses that integrate into the bacterial genome without killing their host, to strengthen the genetic capacity of bacteria in bioremediation processes.

According to the study published in the journal Communications Biology, this approach, known as phage bioaugmentation, could improve the efficiency of traditional bioremediation, which is often slow and limited by environmental constraints on microbial effectiveness.

The research team found that these phages can insert additional metabolic genes into bacteria, thereby enhancing their ability to degrade pollutants such as heavy metals, pesticides and petroleum hydrocarbons.

The researchers said that contamination of soil and waterways remains a global problem threatening human health, agricultural productivity, ecological balance and drinking water supplies.

They warned that before the technology is applied at field scale, regulatory frameworks need to address a number of biosafety issues, including potential gene transfer, persistence and impacts on non-target organisms.

‘If harnessed properly, phage bioaugmentation could be used under controlled conditions to help restore polluted environments and improve microbial resilience,’ said Flinders University researcher Niki Romeo, the study’s lead author.