Lewis Andrews

'The Bacteriophage' series of drawings shines light on the silent assassins ruthlessly killing millions of bacteria every single day. Phages are all around us, both on our skin and within our bodies. A Phage is a virus that attacks by locking onto the surface of another cell, puncturing the surface with its spiked tip and injecting its genetic material in order to take over the internal production factories of a cell to make new Phages. Fortunately for me and you, they only attack bacteria with a specific phage genus targeting a specific bacterial genus. Think of them as highly sophisticated microbiological missiles. 

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These assassins are everywhere on Earth. Our cells encounter them every day, both on us and inside us, and politely get ignored by the Phage while it searches for its next target. An average of 40% of all bacteria are killed by Phages in the ocean every single day. 

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Recently, Phages have generated a lot of interest in our pursuit of trying to cure difficult illnesses regarding antibiotic resistance. With certain strains of bacteria becoming more and more resistant to antibiotics, the days when a scratch or a cough could kill you are becoming a reality once again. However, Phages are specialised killers, and we may be able to find a way to identify a phage which attacks these problematic bacteria, breed them and inject them into our bodies to cure these illnesses. Even if the bacteria evolve, Phages also evolve, and a study has also shown that sometimes, to become more resistant to phages, bacteria may have to give up some of their antibiotic resistance. This is all new science and still very much in the research and testing phase. Whichever the case, this is a war that has been waged between Phages and Bacteria for millions of years, and it doesn't show any sign of slowing down. 

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