Table 1.

Comparison of depolymerase, endolysin and holin derived from phages in the treatment of bacterial infections.

Aspect	Depolymerase	Endolysin	Holin
Belongs to	a part of phage	almost all phages	almost all phages
Action site	polysaccharide	peptidoglycan	membrane
Specificity	narrow spectrum: one or limited to a bacterial species	narrow spectrum: one or limited to a bacterial species	broad spectrum: Gram-positive or Gram-negative species or both
Mechanism	degrade polysaccharide of bacterial biofilm	lysis cell wall of bacteria	punch bacterial membrane
Evolution	co-evolve with bacteria	co-evolve with bacteria	co-evolve with bacteria
Expression process	easy	easy	difficult
Interaction with bacteria	non-bacteriostatic and non-bacteriacidal	bacteriacidal	bacteriacidal
Affect of microbiota	No	No	Yes