ArticleNature microbiology2026
Large-scale analysis of bacterial genomes reveals thousands of lytic phages.
Article in Nature microbiology, 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed.
- Article
- Smaller Genomes and Shorter Prophage Sequences Differentiate Clinical from Environmental Isolates ofbioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- The role of phages in plant-associated microbial communities.Essays in biochemistry · 2026Review
- A syntenic pangenome of Gardnerella reveals novel plasmids and phage, taxonomic boundaries, and species-level stratification of metabolic and virulence potential.Nature communications · 2026Article
- A Novel Lytic Podovirus AP-20-A InfectingInternational journal of molecular sciences · 2026Article
- The Unified Human Virome Database: A toolkit for expanded human virome analysis.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- A Century-Old Solution for 21st Century Challenges: Current Applications with a Focus on Biocontrol, Environmental Impacts, and Regulatory Perspectives.Antibiotics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Phylogenetic support of pebS as a phage-exclusive auxiliary metabolic gene.FEMS microbiology letters · 2026Article
- Antimicrobial Peptides Against Antimicrobial-Resistant Bacteria: Focus on Machine Learning.Infection and drug resistance · 2026Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
19 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Phages are typically classified as temperate, integrating into host genomes, or lytic, replicating and killing bacteria; for this reason, lytic phages are not expected in bacterial genome sequences. Here we analyse 3.6 million bacterial genome assemblies from 1,226 species and find 119,510 lytic phage genomes, which we term bacterial assembly-associated phage sequences. This represents a ~5-fold increase in the number of phages with associated hosts and raises questions about fundamental aspects of phage biology. Our analyses of bacterial assembly-associated phage sequences revealed previously undescribed phage clusters, including clusters distantly related to Salmonella Goslarviruses in Escherichia coli and Shigella, while also substantially expanding known genera such as Seoulvirus (from 16 to >300 members). Close relatives of lytic phages used therapeutically were also detected, suggesting clinical isolate sequencing unknowingly archives potential phage candidates. The discovery of complete, lytic phage genomes within bacterial assemblies challenges assumptions about the nature of the lytic lifestyle and reveals an untapped reservoir of phages.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.