Chickens, mangoes and hypothetical shopping. In this episode we explore phages, the viruses of bacteria. We talk to researchers who are looking to harness bacteria-killing abilities of phages to tackle the issue of Salmonella in poultry farming in Kenya and Pakistan and how this novel technology might be perceived and adopted by end-users.

Innovating Alternatives is a serialized podcast series that will take you right to the cutting edge of science, where researchers are developing new and surprising alternatives to antibiotics and innovative solutions to reduce the use of antimicrobials in livestock and aquaculture production.

For show notes please visit: https://www.idrc.ca/en/research-in-action/innovating-alternatives

Get in touch and let us know what you think of the podcast by email [email protected] or on twitter @Livestock_IDRC

To learn more about the Innovative Veterinary Solutions for Antimicrobial Resistance (InnoVet-AMR) initiative please visit: https://www.idrc.ca/en/initiative/innovet-amr-innovative-veterinary-solutions-antimicrobial-resistance

Image: By Emily Brown combined the pictures ‘Phage’ by Dr Graham Beards, also licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0., and ‘Bxz2_Plaque’ by Deborah Jacobs-Sera and Graham Hatfull. - Combination + modification of the pictures ‘Phage’ by Dr Graham Beards, also licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0., and ‘Bxz2_Plaque’ by Deborah Jacobs-Sera and Graham Hatfull., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=99696994

Caption: Transmission electron micrograph of multiple bacteriophages attached to a bacterial cell wall; the magnification is approximately 200,000.