Exploring the Pathogenic Potential of Isolated from Seafood Harvested along the Mangaluru Coast, India.

It has been observed that not all strains of are virulent. Determining the virulence of strains that are frequently present in seafood is of significance for ensuring seafood safety. This study is an attempt to predict the virulence of seafood-borne isolated along the Mangaluru Coast, India. The isolates tested possessed a gene sequence with high similarity to that in the clinical strain. Transcriptional analysis of core virulence genes in seafood isolate E4010 showed the phenomenon of contact-mediated expression of which correlated well with the actin disintegration and cytotoxicity. These results suggest that the seafood isolates tested in this study possess a functional RtxA1 which could help in initiating the infection. However, other putative virulence genes such as encoding an extracellular protease, encoding hemolysin, encoding tad pilin and encoding fibronectin-binding protein were also constitutively expressed. Virulence-associated attributes such as cytotoxicity and adherence matched the response of the clinical strain ( > 0.05). On the other hand, the environmental strains showed higher serum sensitivity compared with the clinical strain. These findings show that the part of virulence attributes required for the disease process might be intact in these isolates.