Potential of phage EF-N13 as an alternative treatment strategy for mastitis infections caused by multidrug-resistant Enterococcus faecalis

Bovine mastitis is the most common and costly disease affecting dairy cattle throughout world. Enterococcus faecalis one of environmental origin mastitis-causing pathogens. The treatment bovine primarily based on antibiotics. Due to negative impact developing antibiotic resistance adverse effects soil water environments, trend toward use nonantibiotic treatments increasing. Phages may represent a promising alternative strategy. However, it unknown whether phages have therapeutic E. faecalis-induced mastitis. Thus, objective this study was investigate degree protection conferred by phage during murine caused multidrug-resistant faecalis. isolated from milk cows with mastitis, using isolates as hosts. bactericidal ability against prevent biofilm formation were determined in vitro. potential evaluated vivo. We 14 strains all which exhibited multidrug resistance, (10/14) could form strong biofilms. Subsequently, new (EF-N13) N13 (isolated mastitic milk) host. EF-N13 belongs family Myoviridae, has short latent periods (5 min) high bursts (284 pfu/cell). genome lacked bacterial virulence-, resistance-, lysogenesis-related genes. Furthermore, loading raw medium significantly reduced unaffected IgG antibodies. In fact, effectively All these characteristics suggest that therapy. vivo, 1 × 105 cfu/gland resulted development within 24 h. A single dose (1 104, 105, or 106 pfu/gland) decrease counts mammary gland at h postinfection. Histopathological observations demonstrated alleviated inflammation damage. This effect confirmed lower levels proinflammatory cytokines IL-6, IL-1β, TNF-α treated compared those phosphate-buffered saline. Overall, data underscored an therapy for