Abstract
Tailed bacteriophages with genomes larger than 200 kbp are classified as Jumbo phages, and are rarely isolated by conventional methods. These phages are designated “jumbo” owing to their most notable features of a large phage virion and large genome size. However, in addition to these, jumbo phages also exhibit several novel characteristics that have not been observed for phages with smaller genomes, which differentiate jumbo phages in terms of genome organization, virion structure, progeny propagation, and evolution. In this review, we summarize available reports on jumbo phages and discuss the differences between jumbo phages and small-genome phages. We also discuss data suggesting that jumbo phages might have evolved from phages with smaller genomes by acquiring additional functional genes, and that these additional genes reduce the dependence of the jumbo phages on the host bacteria.
Highlights
Bacteriophages are viruses that infect bacteria and are the most abundant biological entities on earth, exhibiting extremely high, uncharted diversity (Krupovic et al, 2011)
We summarize the characteristics, and discuss the diversity and evolution of jumbo phages
Larger viruses have been isolated, and their discovery has greatly enriched our understanding of biological entity diversity and evolution (Bhunchoth et al, 2015; Sharma et al, 2015)
Summary
Bacteriophages are viruses that infect bacteria and are the most abundant biological entities on earth, exhibiting extremely high, uncharted diversity (Krupovic et al, 2011). It is unclear if jumbo phage infecting only a single genus of Gram-positive bacteria is due to a special feature of Bacillus or just an anomaly of the small number of jumbo phages currently isolated.
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