Phages are your friends

GRUINARD, an island located off the north-west coast of Scotland, was uninhabitable for five decades thanks to a successful biological-weapons experiment. During the second world war, the British army conducted a test involving a flock of sheep and a cluster of bombs containing anthrax spores. The army learned not only that Bacillus anthracis is effective at destroying sheep. It also discovered that the bacterium has the propensity to render land uninhabitable. Only half a century and 280 tonnes of formaldehyde later was Gruinard deemed safe to visit. Thankfully, a quicker, cheaper and more effective means of decontaminating soil infected with anthrax has been discovered.