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Record W4414939183 · doi:10.1101/2025.10.07.681051

Serine recombinases are conserved genetic markers of antiphage defense systems

2025· preprint· en· W4414939183 on OpenAlexaff
Shelby E. Andersen, Joshua M. Kirsch, S Garrett, John C. Whitney, Jay R. Hesselberth, Breck A. Duerkop

Bibliographic record

VenuebioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2025
Typepreprint
Languageen
FieldAgricultural and Biological Sciences
TopicPlant Virus Research Studies
Canadian institutionsMcMaster University
FundersNational Institute of Allergy and Infectious DiseasesNational Institutes of HealthNational Science Foundation
KeywordsRecombinaseEffectorBacteriophageGenomeGeneCre recombinaseIntegrasesSerine

Abstract

fetched live from OpenAlex

Antiphage defense systems confer bacteriophage (phage) resistance in bacteria. Renewed interest in phage therapy indicates a need to understand the breadth and molecular mechanisms of antiphage defenses. Traditionally, strategies to identify antiphage defenses lack throughput or are biased toward model bacteria. Herein, we developed a bioinformatic pipeline that uses a serine recombinase to identify known and unknown antiphage defense systems. Using this approach to query reference genomes and metagenomes, we show that serine recombinase genes are genetically linked to antiphage defense systems and serve as bait for finding these systems across diverse bacterial phyla. Using co-transcription predictions and statistical analysis of protein domain abundances, we experimentally validated our informatic approach by discovering that KAP P-loop NTPases are fused to putative antiphage effector domains and prokaryotic Schlafen proteins support phage defense. Our work shows that serine recombinases are a reliable genetic marker for the discovery of antiphage defenses across diverse bacterial phyla.

Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.

How this classification was reachedexpand

Full frame machine prediction

Teacher imitation

Not calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.

metaresearch head score (Codex)0.001
metaresearch head score (Gemma)0.002
Version: metacan-v3-hybrid-931329e0061cValidation status: machine_predicted_unvalidated
Candidate categoriesnone
Consensus categoriesnone
DomainCandidate signal: none · Consensus signal: none
Study designCandidate signal: Observational · Consensus signal: none
GenreCandidate signal: Empirical · Consensus signal: Empirical
Teacher disagreement score0.001
Threshold uncertainty score0.004

Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)

CategoryCodexGemma
Metaresearch0.0010.002
Meta-epidemiology (narrow)0.0010.000
Meta-epidemiology (broad)0.0010.000
Bibliometrics0.0010.001
Science and technology studies0.0000.000
Scholarly communication0.0010.001
Open science0.0000.000
Research integrity0.0010.001
Insufficient payload (model declined to judge)0.0010.001

Machine scores (provisional)

The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.

Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.

Opus teacher head0.027
GPT teacher head0.225
Teacher spread0.198 · how far apart the two teachers sit on this one work
Validation statusscore_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from it

Classification

machine, unvalidated

Machine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.

The models applied no category: nothing in the taxonomy fit this work.
Study designObservational
Domainnot available
GenreEmpirical

How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".

Quick stats

Citations1
Published2025
Admission routes1
Has abstractyes

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