Identification of lytic bacteriophage MmP1, assigned to a new member of T7-like phages infecting Morganella morganii.

MmP1 (Morganella morganii phage 1) is a lytic bacteriophage newly isolated from the host bacterium M. morganii. The entire genome was sequenced, and final assembly yielded a 38,234bp linear double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) with a G+C content of 46.5%. In the MmP1 genome, 49 putative genes, 10 putative promoters and 2 predicted sigma-independent terminators were determined through bioinformatic analysis. A striking feature of the MmP1 genome is its high degree of similarity to the T7 group of phages. All of the 49 predicted genes exist on the same DNA strand, and functions were assigned to 35 genes based on the similarity of the homologues deposited in GenBank, which share 30-80% identity to their counterparts in T7-like phages. The analyses of MmP1 using CoreGenes, phylogenetic tree of RNA polymerase and structural proteins have demonstrated that bacteriophage MmP1 should be assigned as a new member of T7-like phages but as a relatively distant member of this family. This is the first report that a T7-like phage adaptively parasitizes in M. morganii, and this will advance our understanding of biodiversity and adaptive evolution of T7-like phages.