Institut für Mikrobiologie, Stiftung Tierärztliche Hochschule Hannover, Germany.
Vet Microbiol. 2011 Mar 24;148(2-4):238-45. doi: 10.1016/j.vetmic.2010.08.012. Epub 2010 Sep 21.
Bartonella species are Gram-negative, fastidious bacteria. Bartonella henselae is found in cats and transmitted to humans via cat scratches or bites causing cat-scratch disease, characterized by clinical symptoms with varying severity. The prevalence of bartonellosis among humans in Germany appears to be high, and severe clinical cases have been described. However, epidemiological data of B. henselae in cats are rare. In this study we determined the detection rates of Bartonella ssp. in cats by culture and real-time PCR. Furthermore, B. henselae isolates were genetically characterized by highly discriminatory amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) and multilocus sequence typing (MLST). Bartonella spp. were isolated by culture from 11 (2.2%) of 507 blood samples. Out of 169 blood samples additionally analyzed by PCR, 28 (16.6%) were found positive for Bartonella spp., illustrating the advantage of PCR in Bartonella spp. detection. PCR-REA identified B. henselae in 27 cats and Bartonella clarridgeiae in one cat. B. henselae isolates from different geographical regions in Germany were genetically characterized by AFLP and MLST. Both methods confirmed genetic diversity of B. henselae on the strain level. MLST identified 11 new sequence types, all of them assigned to three clonal complexes as determined by eBURST. AFLP typing revealed genetic relation among the B. henselae isolates from the same geographical region. Combining AFLP typing and MLST/eBURST analyses revealed that B. henselae of the same AFLP subcluster belonged to the same clonal complex. Altogether these results indicate that B. henselae may evolve clonally.
巴尔通体物种是革兰氏阴性、苛刻的细菌。汉氏巴尔通体存在于猫中，并通过猫抓或咬伤传播给人类，导致猫抓病，其特征是临床症状严重程度不同。德国人类巴通体病的流行率似乎很高，并且已经描述了严重的临床病例。然而，猫中巴尔通体病的流行病学数据很少。在这项研究中，我们通过培养和实时 PCR 确定了猫中巴尔通体亚种的检测率。此外，通过高度区分的扩增片段长度多态性（AFLP）和多位点序列分型（MLST）对汉氏巴尔通体分离株进行了遗传特征分析。通过培养从 507 份血液样本中分离出 11 份（2.2%）巴尔通体。在另外分析的 169 份血液样本中，28 份（16.6%）被检测出巴尔通体属阳性，这说明了 PCR 在巴尔通体属检测中的优势。PCR-REA 在 27 只猫中鉴定出汉氏巴尔通体，在 1 只猫中鉴定出克拉里吉氏巴尔通体。德国不同地理区域的汉氏巴尔通体分离株通过 AFLP 和 MLST 进行了遗传特征分析。这两种方法都证实了汉氏巴尔通体在菌株水平上的遗传多样性。MLST 确定了 11 个新的序列类型，所有这些都分配给三个克隆复合体，这是由 eBURST 确定的。AFLP 分型显示来自同一地理区域的汉氏巴尔通体分离株之间存在遗传关系。AFLP 分型和 MLST/eBURST 分析的结合表明，相同 AFLP 亚群的汉氏巴尔通体属于同一克隆复合体。总的来说，这些结果表明汉氏巴尔通体可能是克隆进化的。
