Bacteriophages play an essential role in the transferring of genes that contribute to the bacterial virulence and whose products are dangerous to human health. Interestingly, phages carrying virulence genes are mostly temperate and in contrast to lytic phages undergo both lysogenic and lytic cycles. Importantly, expression of the majority of phage genes and subsequent production of phage encoded proteins is suppressed during lysogeny. The expression of the majority of phage genes is tightly linked to lytic development. Among others, small non-coding RNAs (sRNAs) of phage origin are involved in the regulation of phage gene expression and thus play an important role in both phage and host development. In the case of bacteria, sRNAs affect processes such as virulence, colonization ability, motility and cell growth or death. In turn, in the case of phages, they play essential roles during the early stage of infection, maintaining the state of lysogeny and silencing the expression of late structural genes, thereby regulating the transition between phage life cycles. Interestingly, sRNAs have been identified in both lytic and temperate phages and they have been discussed in this work according to this classification. Particular attention was paid to viral sRNAs resembling eukaryotic microRNAs.

噬菌体在导致细菌毒力的基因转移中发挥着重要作用，其产物对人类健康有害。有趣的是，携带毒力基因的噬菌体大多是温和的，与裂解噬菌体相反，它经历溶原和裂解周期。重要的是，大多数噬菌体基因的表达和随后噬菌体编码蛋白的产生在溶原性过程中受到抑制。大多数噬菌体基因的表达与裂解发育密切相关。其中，噬菌体来源的小非编码 RNA (sRNA) 参与噬菌体基因表达的调节，因此在噬菌体和宿主发育中都发挥着重要作用。在细菌的情况下，sRNA 会影响诸如毒力、定殖能力、运动和细胞生长或死亡等过程。反过来，就噬菌体而言，它们在感染的早期发挥重要作用，维持溶原状态并沉默晚期结构基因的表达，从而调节噬菌体生命周期之间的过渡。有趣的是，已经在裂解和温带噬菌体中鉴定出 sRNA，并且在这项工作中根据这种分类对其进行了讨论。特别关注类似于真核微RNA的病毒sRNA。