Transduction in Bacillus subtilis by Bacteriophage SPP1

Lysates of the virulent bacteriophage SPP1 were shown to be capable of mediating generalized transduction. Suppressible mutants of this bacteriophage (sus) were capable of transduction at a lower multiplicity of infection than virulent SPP1. Linkage analysis demonstrated that bacteriophage SPP1 transduced segments of the genome equal in size to that transferred by SP10. This bacteriophage should be useful in analyzing the regions of the genome where PBS1 appears to give anomalous results.