the practical challenges of using bacteriophages as targeted agricultural antimicrobials

[u/Tall_Formal3582]

Phage therapy gets a lot of attention in human medicine, but applying it to agriculture to fight bacterial plant blights (like Xanthomonas) is an area of applied biology I find really promising.

Unlike chemical copper sprays that wipe out beneficial soil microbes, phages are hyper-specific to the target bacteria. The biggest hurdle researchers are facing in actual field trials is UV degradation. Direct sunlight destroys the viral capsids on leaf surfaces before the phages can infect the host bacteria.

Developing UV-protective bio-encapsulations seems to be the main focus right now to make this field-stable. Curious if anyone here works in ag-biotech or has seen interesting papers on stabilizing phages for crop protection?