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Identification And Characterisation Of Novel Phages Of Pectobacterium And Erwinia, Colin Buttimer

PhDs

Losses in crop yields due to disease need to be reduced to meet increasing global food demands associated with growth in the human population. There is a well-recognised need to develop new environmentally-friendly control strategies to combat bacterial crop diseases. There are several crop diseases for which no effective bactericidal agents are currently available, such as potato blackleg and soft rot disease caused by Pectobacterium atrosepticum and other members of soft rot Enterobacteriaceae (Czajkowski et al., 2011). Furthermore, current control measures involving the use of traditional chemicals or antibiotics are losing their efficacy due to the natural development of bacterial …