An insight into the emergence of as an oro-dental pathogen and its drug resistance gene profile - An in silico approach.

BACKGROUND

, a potential nosocomial pathogen has stealthily gained entry into the oral cavity. Their association with other pathogens like in chronic and aggressive periodontitis cases is well documented. The magnitude of problem caused by could be attributed to resistance genes acquired by the organism. Since the microbiome of oral cavity is heterogeneous and complex, the transfer of genes from multidrug resistant may be a serious threat in infection control and management. In view of this fact, the present study aims to categorize and characterize drug resistant genes present in each of the 19 genomes of selected for the study.

METHODS

About 19 genome sequences of spp with the predominance of different strains of was genotyped using restriction digestion and pulse field gel electrophoresis (PFGE). Further, the prevalence of common drug resistant genes in the genome of various spp was recorded using PCR analysis.

RESULTS

Based on the PFGE pattern, phylogenetic tree was constructed and the genomes were clustered into 6 genotypes. Genotype 4 (n = 8; 42.10%) and 5 (n = 6; 31.57%) were predominant, followed by genotypes 2 (n = 2; 10.52%), 1, 3 and 6 (n = 1; 5.26%). Three species were excluded from the list since they were negative for most of the drug resistant genes tested. Prevalence of drug resistant genes in each of the 16 genomes analysed found , and to be the major genes found in . spp belonging to genotypes 4 and 5 were found to harbour 6-10 and 2-8 potential drug resistant genes respectively.

CONCLUSION

The present study showed cluster of multi-drug resistant genes in genomes analysed, thus, warranting the need for antibiotic surveillance, alternate therapeutic measures and development of novel antimicrobials. An extensive study on the genes conferring drug resistance in this pathogen will open new avenues for battling the entry and spread of this pathogen in vulnerable patient groups.