Li Meixia, Cai Chao, Chen Juan, Cheng Changwei, Cheng Guofu, Hu Xueying, Liu Cuiping
College of Veterinary Medicine, Huazhong Agricultural University, 1st Shizishan Street, Wuhan 430070, China.
Int J Mol Sci. 2016 Sep 22;17(10):1599. doi: 10.3390/ijms17101599.
Streptococcus gallolyticus subsp. pasteurianus is an under-recognized pathogen and zoonotic agent causing opportunistic infections in humans. Despite increasing recognition of this subspecies as a cause for human infectious diseases, limited information is known about its antibiotic resistance mechanism. In this study, we aim to identify the molecular mechanism underlying the high macrolide resistance of six S. gallolyticus subsp. pasteurianus isolates from dead ducklings collected in several natural outbreaks in China during 2010-2013. All isolates exhibited multi-drug resistance including high macrolide resistance (MIC ≥ 1024 mg/L for erythromycin, and 512 mg/L for clarithromycin). Efflux-encoding mefA and mefE genes were not detectable in these isolates. The presence of 23S rRNA mutations in specific isolates did not significantly change macrolide MICs. No nucleotide substitutions were found in genes encoding ribosomal proteins L4 or L22. The ermB and ermT genes were found in the genomes of all isolates. These two genes were acquired independently in one highly virulent isolate AL101002, and clustered with Tn916 and IS1216, respectively. The expression of both ermB and ermT in all isolates was erythromycin inducible and yielded comparable macrolide MICs in all six isolates. Taken together, inducible expression of both ermB and ermT conferred high macrolide resistance in these S. gallolyticus subsp. pasterianus isolates. Our findings reveal new macrolide resistance features in S. gallolyticus subsp. pasteurianus by both ermB and ermT.
解没食子酸链球菌巴氏亚种是一种未得到充分认识的病原体和人畜共患病原体,可引起人类机会性感染。尽管该亚种作为人类传染病病因的认识日益增加,但关于其抗生素耐药机制的信息却知之甚少。在本研究中,我们旨在确定6株解没食子酸链球菌巴氏亚种对大环内酯类高度耐药的分子机制,这些菌株是从2010 - 2013年中国几次自然暴发中收集的死雏鸭中分离得到的。所有分离株均表现出多重耐药性,包括对大环内酯类高度耐药(红霉素的MIC≥1024mg/L,克拉霉素的MIC为512mg/L)。在这些分离株中未检测到编码外排的mefA和mefE基因。特定分离株中23S rRNA突变的存在并未显著改变大环内酯类的MIC。在编码核糖体蛋白L4或L22的基因中未发现核苷酸替换。在所有分离株的基因组中均发现了ermB和ermT基因。这两个基因在一个高毒力分离株AL101002中分别独立获得,并分别与Tn916和IS1216聚集。所有分离株中ermB和ermT的表达均为红霉素诱导型,并且在所有6株分离株中产生了相当的大环内酯类MIC。综上所述,ermB和ermT的诱导表达赋予了这些解没食子酸链球菌巴氏亚种分离株对大环内酯类的高度耐药性。我们的研究结果揭示了解没食子酸链球菌巴氏亚种中由ermB和ermT介导的新的大环内酯类耐药特征。