[Isolation of V. cholerae no-01 and V. metschnikovii from sewage of the city of Mar del Plata].

A total of 42 vibrio strains isolated from sewage, together with 7 culture collection strains were studied by numerical taxonomy. A simplified clustering is shown in Fig. 1. Two important phena were determined. Phenon 1, identified as V. cholerae non-01, formed at 0.90% S, contains 32 sewage strains and 2 reference strains. Phenon 2, identified as V. metschnikovii, formed at 0.85% S, contains 5 sewage strains. No typical marine vibrio species were isolated. The phenotypic characteristics of 2 phena are shown in Table 2. All V. cholerae non-01 were haemolytic, proteolytic and lipolytic. They also showed some phenotypic characteristics (degradation of esculin, 81.2%; utilization of: D-glucuronate, 88.2%; cellobiose, 47.0% and lactose, 47.0%), and growth in NaCl 6%, 91.1%. According to literature references, the survival of V. cholerae non-01 in Mar del Plata marine environment is possible.