Project description:An important, but rarely performed, test of Koch’s molecular postulates involves evaluating the capacity of candidate virulence genes to confer pathogenicity in otherwise non-virulent species. Unbiased genomic surveys of avirulent natural isolates might reveal rare variants possessing specific virulence features, which might prove useful in testing their functional sufficiency. Using a custom pan-genome array, we analyzed a panel of avirulent Burkholderia thailandensis (Bt) isolates related to Burkholderia pseudomallei (Bp), the causative agent of the often fatal human and animal disease melioidosis. We report the discovery of variant Bt isolates exhibiting isolated acquisition of a capsular polysaccharide biosynthesis gene cluster (BpCPS), long regarded as an critical species-specific virulence factor essential for Bp mammalian virulence. BpCPS-expressing Bt strains exhibited certain pathogen-related phenotypes including resistance to human complement binding, but did not exhibit enhanced virulence when assessed in two different in vivo animal infection models. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that the BpCPS-expressing Bt strains likely reside within an evolutionary subgroup distinct from the majority of previously-described Bt strains. Our findings suggest that BpCPS acquisition alone is unlikely to fully explain the ability of Bp to colonize humans and animals, highlighting the importance of other collaborating factors in the pathogenesis of mammalian melioidosis.
Project description:An important, but rarely performed, test of Koch’s molecular postulates involves evaluating the capacity of candidate virulence genes to confer pathogenicity in otherwise non-virulent species. Unbiased genomic surveys of avirulent natural isolates might reveal rare variants possessing specific virulence features, which might prove useful in testing their functional sufficiency. Using a custom pan-genome array, we analyzed a panel of avirulent Burkholderia thailandensis (Bt) isolates related to Burkholderia pseudomallei (Bp), the causative agent of the often fatal human and animal disease melioidosis. We report the discovery of variant Bt isolates exhibiting isolated acquisition of a capsular polysaccharide biosynthesis gene cluster (BpCPS), long regarded as an critical species-specific virulence factor essential for Bp mammalian virulence. BpCPS-expressing Bt strains exhibited certain pathogen-related phenotypes including resistance to human complement binding, but did not exhibit enhanced virulence when assessed in two different in vivo animal infection models. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that the BpCPS-expressing Bt strains likely reside within an evolutionary subgroup distinct from the majority of previously-described Bt strains. Our findings suggest that BpCPS acquisition alone is unlikely to fully explain the ability of Bp to colonize humans and animals, highlighting the importance of other collaborating factors in the pathogenesis of mammalian melioidosis. Genomic DNA of several Bt strains were hybridized against a common reference strain (Bt E264), to see gain/loss
Project description:28 Streptomyces strains isolated from common scab lesions of potato tubers from a wide geographic range in Norway, were selected for microarray analysis. The selected strains were subjected to species identification by microarray, 16S phylogenetic analysis and PCR; and microarray-based comparative genome analysis. To our knowledge, this is the first report of S. turgidiscabies and S. europaeiscabiei in Norway.
Project description:Genome profiling of primary tumors and matched metastases from a BALB-NeuT murine breast cancer transplantation model. The first goal of this study was to investigate the differences of primary tumors and metastases with regard to copy number alterations. The second goal was to infer phylogenetic trees reflecting the evolutionary paths of primary tumors and their derived metastases (only mice with at least one metastasis were used for phylogenetic analyses).
Project description:Melioidosis is a severe infectious disease caused by Burkholderia pseudomallei, a gram-negative bacillus classified by the NIAID as a category B priority agent. Septicemia is the most common presentation of the disease with 40% mortality rate even with appropriate treatments. Faster diagnostic procedures are required to improve therapeutic response and survival rates. We have used microarray technology to generate genome-wide transcriptional profiles (>48,000 transcripts) of whole blood obtained from patients with septicemic melioidosis (n=32), patients with sepsis caused by other pathogens (n=31), and uninfected controls (n=29). Unsupervised analyses demonstrated the existence of a whole blood transcriptional signature distinguishing patients with sepsis from control subjects. The majority of changes observed were common to both septicemic melioidosis and sepsis caused by other infections, including genes related to inflammation, interferon-related genes, neutrophils, cytotoxic cells, and T cells. Finally, class prediction analysis identified a 37 transcript candidate diagnostic signature that distinguished melioidosis from sepsis caused by other organisms with 100% and 78% accuracy in training and independent test sets, respectively. This finding was confirmed by the independent validation set, which showed 80% prediction accuracy. This signature was highly enriched in genes coding for products involved in the MHC Class II antigen processing and presentation pathway. Transcriptional patterns of whole blood RNA distinguish patients with septicemic melioidosis from patients with sepsis caused by other pathogens. Once confirmed in a large scale trial this diagnostic signature might constitute the basis of a differential diagnostic assay.
Project description:Melioidosis, caused by Gram negative bacteria Burkholderia pseudomallei, is a major type of community-acquired septicemia in Southeast Asia and Northern Australia with high mortality and morbidity rate. More accurate and rapid diagnosis is needed for improving the management of septicemic melioidosis. We previously identified 37-gene candidate signature to distinguish septicemic melioidosis from sepsis due to other pathogens. The aims of this current study were to independently validate our previous biomarker and consolidate gene selection from each of our microarray data set for establishing a targeted assay for the differential diagnosis of melioidosis. Blood samples were collected from patients who presented with severe inflammatory response syndromes from 3 provincial hospitals in Northeast of Thailand during September 2009 and November 2011. Only culture-confirmed sepsis were included in the study (n=166). We generated a new microarray dataset comprising of 29 patients with septicemic melioidosis and 54 patients with sepsis due to other pathogens. Validation of the 37-gene signature using this new dataset demonstrated the prediction accuracy of approximately 80% for detecting type of sepsis. In order to develop a nanoliter-scale high throughput PCR technology, we further identified additional gene signature from this new microarray dataset and by revisiting our published data. Altogether 85 genes including 6 housekeeping genes were selected. Using multi-steps iteration approach we could reduce the number of biomarkers to 12 genes while the performance is comparable to that of the full panel. The high performance (accuracy >70%) of this 12-gene signature could be validated in a second independent set of samples. The 12-gene panel identified by our study provides high performance for the differential diagnosis of septicemic melioidosis. This finding will be useful for improving the management of septicemic melioidosis in term of diagnosis, treatment and follow up.
Project description:Melioidosis is a neglected tropical disease caused by the Gram-negative bacterium Burkholderia pseudomallei. It is widespread in Southeast Asia and under-reported across tropical regions worldwide. Patients present with a range of clinical syndromes including sepsis, pneumonia and focal abscesses, with a mortality rate of 40% in hospitalized patients in Thailand. Up to two-thirds of patients with melioidosis have diabetes mellitus. In this experiment we sought to characterize pathways activated by whole killed B. pseudomallei bacteria and by three vaccine candidate proteins from B. pseudomallei, BPSL2520 (uncharacterized protein), BPSS1525 (BopE) and BPSL2096 (AhpC) in patients with diabetes and acute melioidosis.