Date of Award

Spring 5-8-2025

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Science (BS)

Department

Biology

College

College of Science

First Advisor

Daniel C. Williams

Abstract/Description

Bacteriophages are viruses which solely infect bacteria. They are one of the most abundant and diverse biological entities, yet there is a limited amount of information on these viruses, including their gene functions. Several previously unknown phages have been discovered including Stargaze, whose bacterial host is Mycobacterium Smegmatis. Characterization of phage genes and their functions deepen our understanding of phages and potentially contribute to the broader biomedical effort associated with phages ability to combat bacterial infections. Stargaze is a G5 subcluster phage and it only has one other related phage in its cluster, that phage is from Madagascar. Using a bioinformatic approach gene prediction algorithms Glimmer and GeneMark were used for initial gene identification. This was followed by manual curation using homology-based similarities to other gene sequences via BLAST and predicted structures via HHPRED. This led to the discovery that Stargaze has 65 protein encoding genes. The left arm of the genome contains structural genes including the tape measure protein, minor tail proteins, and portal protein which are responsible for the structure of the phage. The right arm of the genome has genes primarily of unknown function. One interesting gene is the PAPS-reductase like domain, it is an orpham and has no other related genes in its Pham. The completion of this work expands the collection of annotated bacteriophage genomes and provides insight into phage biology.

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