AUGUSTA -- Capital Area Technical Center biotechnology students discovered a bacteriophage virus in a Kennebec River water sample, the sort of work more likely accomplished by graduate-level students, according to their teacher.

And the odds are good, teacher Luci Levesque said, the phage they found may never have been discovered, isolated or identified before.

There's no fear of bacteriophage viruses lurking in the Kennebec, waiting to strike unsuspecting fishermen when they retrieve a fish. They only attack bacteria, not people, and could have helpful, not harmful, uses.

"It's not harmful to anything but bacteria," Cony senior Charlie Parker said.

Levesque said she's taken water samples with students for years but never found a bacteriophage.

When she found it, she ran out into the hallway, yelling for her students to come check out what they had found.

Levesque said there are many, many different types of phages, most of which haven't been identified.

So she believes there's a good chance CATC students were the first to discover, identify and isolate this particular phage. The whole class plans to go down to the University of Southern Maine, where DNA sequencing will be conducted to further identify the phage they found.

"We're going to bring it to USM and sequence it and find out if anyone else has ever discovered it," said Brianna Smith, a junior from Monmouth, as she worked under a vented hood in the lab at the technical center, seeking to further isolate the phage, which would help identify it.

"There is a pretty good chance this hasn't been discovered. I think that's really cool," she said. "This is what people work years to get done, and we did it in a month.

"I love science. This is a dream class to me. It's not even work. It's fun."

Amber Poirier, a senior from Hall-Dale, said they took six water samples from different water sources on and around Swan Island in Richmond. The only sample that contained a phage was the one taken from the eastern side of the Kennebec River.

Parker and Martin Vigue, a senior from Cony, said they determined it was a phage by putting a sample of the phage on petri dishes covered with different forms of bacteria.

The phage attacked an E. coli B bacteria sample, leaving the petri dish free of bacteria where the phage was placed.

Molly Cyr and Nicole Poirier, both seniors from Hall-Dale, said students took the samples about a month ago. They had already done some research on phages, but none of them expected to find any, they said.

Levesque noted phages can be used to fight bacteria and, thus, disease. They may also be used to treat infections because they attack bacteria but don't attack human cells.

They plan to work with Monroe Duboise in the department of applied medical science at USM. Levesque said it could take months to fully sequence the DNA of the phage so it can be further identified.

If it turns out to be new, they may even be able to name it.

Smith, carefully transferring samples between small vials as she worked to isolate the phage further, said they hadn't really thought of a name yet.

Keith Edwards -- 621-5647

kedwards@centralmaine.com