When antibiotics, once hailed as “miracle drugs,” become ecological disruptors, we have to ask: without antibiotics, what else can we rely on?

The answer lies in one of the most abundant biological entities in nature: bacteriophages.

Bacteriophages, or phages, are viruses that specifically infect bacteria. They are widely present in soil, water, and animal intestinal tracts. Since their discovery in 1915, phages have been studied for more than a century.

Their key feature is precision: like “one key for one lock,” each phage targets specific bacterial hosts.