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Identification of a genetic locus responsible for antimicrobial peptide resistance in Clostridium difficile.

ABSTRACT: Clostridium difficile causes chronic intestinal disease, yet little is understood about how the bacterium interacts with and survives in the host. To colonize the intestine and cause persistent disease, the bacterium must circumvent killing by host innate immune factors, such as cationic antimicrobial peptides (CAMPs). In this study, we investigated the effect of model CAMPs on growth and found that C. difficile is not only sensitive to these compounds but also responds to low levels of CAMPs by expressing genes that lead to CAMP resistance. By plating the bacterium on medium containing the CAMP nisin, we isolated a mutant capable of growing in three times the inhibitory concentration of CAMPs. This mutant also showed increased resistance to the CAMPs gallidermin and polymyxin B, demonstrating tolerance to different types of antimicrobial peptides. We identified the mutated gene responsible for the resistance phenotype as CD1352. This gene encodes a putative orphan histidine kinase that lies adjacent to a predicted ABC transporter operon (CD1349 to CD1351). Transcriptional analysis of the ABC transporter genes revealed that this operon was upregulated in the presence of nisin in wild-type cells and was more highly expressed in the CD1352 mutant. The insertional disruption of the CD1349 gene resulted in significant decreases in resistance to the CAMPs nisin and gallidermin but not polymyxin B. Because of their role in cationic antimicrobial peptide resistance, we propose the designation cprABC for genes CD1349 to CD1351 and cprK for the CD1352 gene. These results provide the first evidence of a C. difficile gene associated with antimicrobial peptide resistance.

SUBMITTER: McBride SM

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3019887 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Identification of a genetic locus responsible for antimicrobial peptide resistance in Clostridium difficile.

McBride Shonna M SM Sonenshein Abraham L AL

Infection and immunity 20101025 1

Clostridium difficile causes chronic intestinal disease, yet little is understood about how the bacterium interacts with and survives in the host. To colonize the intestine and cause persistent disease, the bacterium must circumvent killing by host innate immune factors, such as cationic antimicrobial peptides (CAMPs). In this study, we investigated the effect of model CAMPs on growth and found that C. difficile is not only sensitive to these compounds but also responds to low levels of CAMPs by ...[more]

PMID: 20974818

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Project description:Clostridium difficile infection (CDI) is an important cause of mortality and morbidity in healthcare settings. The major virulence determinants are large clostridial toxins, toxin A (tcdA) and toxin B (tcdB), encoded within the pathogenicity locus (PaLoc). Isolates vary in pathogenicity from hypervirulent PCR-ribotypes 027 and 078 with high mortality, to benign non-toxigenic strains carried asymptomatically. The relative pathogenicity of most toxigenic genotypes is still unclear, but may be influenced by PaLoc genetic variant. This is the largest study of C. difficile molecular epidemiology performed to date, in which a representative collection of recent isolates (n?=?1290) from patients with CDI in Oxfordshire, UK, was genotyped by multilocus sequence typing. The population structure was described using NeighborNet and ClonalFrame. Sequence variation within toxin B (tcdB) and its negative regulator (tcdC), was mapped onto the population structure. The 69 Sequence Types (ST) showed evidence for homologous recombination with an effect on genetic diversification four times lower than mutation. Five previously recognised genetic groups or clades persisted, designated 1 to 5, each having a strikingly congruent association with tcdB and tcdC variants. Hypervirulent ST-11 (078) was the only member of clade 5, which was divergent from the other four clades within the MLST loci. However, it was closely related to the other clades within the tcdB and tcdC loci. ST-11 (078) may represent a divergent formerly non-toxigenic strain that acquired the PaLoc (at least) by genetic recombination. This study focused on human clinical isolates collected from a single geographic location, to achieve a uniquely high density of sampling. It sets a baseline of MLST data for future comparative studies investigating genotype virulence potential (using clinical severity data for these isolates), possible reservoirs of human CDI, and the evolutionary origins of hypervirulent strains.

Dataset Information

Identification of a genetic locus responsible for antimicrobial peptide resistance in Clostridium difficile.

Publications

Identification of a genetic locus responsible for antimicrobial peptide resistance in Clostridium difficile.

Similar Datasets

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