This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Copyright Information Books from ASM Press MicrobeWorld Citing Articles Citing Articles via HighWire Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Musser, J M Articles by Kapur, V Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Musser, J M Articles by Kapur, V

Clonal analysis of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus strains from intercontinental sources: association of the mec gene with divergent phylogenetic lineages implies dissemination by horizontal transfer and recombination.

Department of Pathology, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, Texas.

ABSTRACT

Genetic relationships among 254 isolates of Staphylococcus aureus resistant to methicillin recovered between 1961 and 1992 from nine countries on four continents were determined by analyzing electrophoretically demonstrable allelic variation at 15 chromosomal enzyme loci. Fifteen distinctive electrophoretic types, marking clones, were identified. The mec gene is harbored by many divergent phylogenetic lineages representing a large portion of the breadth of chromosomal diversity in the species, a result that is interpreted as evidence that multiple episodes of horizontal transfer and recombination have contributed to the spread of this resistance determinant in natural populations. Isolates recovered in the United Kingdom, Denmark, Switzerland, Egypt, and Uganda in the 1960s are of a single multilocus enzyme genotype and probably are progeny of an ancestral methicillin-resistant clone. There is geographic variation in the frequency of recovery of the common methicillin-resistant clones, an observation that may in part explain reported regional differences in natural history correlates of resistant organisms.

This article has been cited by other articles:

• Mastoraki, A., Kriaras, I., Douka, E., Mastoraki, S., Stravopodis, G., Geroulanos, S. (2008). Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus preventing strategy in cardiac surgery. ICVTS 7: 452-456 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Kuhn, G., Francioli, P., Blanc, D. S. (2007). Double-Locus Sequence Typing Using clfB and spa, a Fast and Simple Method for Epidemiological Typing of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus. J. Clin. Microbiol. 45: 54-62 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Revazishvili, T., Bakanidze, L., Gomelauri, T., Zhgenti, E., Chanturia, G., Kekelidze, M., Rajanna, C., Kreger, A., Sulakvelidze, A. (2006). Genetic Background and Antibiotic Resistance of Staphylococcus aureus Strains Isolated in the Republic of Georgia.. J. Clin. Microbiol. 44: 3477-3483 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Wisplinghoff, H., Ewertz, B., Wisplinghoff, S., Stefanik, D., Plum, G., Perdreau-Remington, F., Seifert, H. (2005). Molecular Evolution of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus in the Metropolitan Area of Cologne, Germany, from 1984 to 1998. J. Clin. Microbiol. 43: 5445-5451 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Hanssen, A.-M., Fossum, A., Mikalsen, J., Halvorsen, D. S., Bukholm, G., Sollid, J. U. E. (2005). Dissemination of Community-Acquired Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Clones in Northern Norway: Sequence Types 8 and 80 Predominate. J. Clin. Microbiol. 43: 2118-2124 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Coombs, G. W., Nimmo, G. R., Bell, J. M., Huygens, F., O'Brien, F. G., Malkowski, M. J., Pearson, J. C., Stephens, A. J., Giffard, P. M., the Australian Group for Antimicrobial Resistance, (2004). Genetic Diversity among Community Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Strains Causing Outpatient Infections in Australia. J. Clin. Microbiol. 42: 4735-4743 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Shukla, S. K., Stemper, M. E., Ramaswamy, S. V., Conradt, J. M., Reich, R., Graviss, E. A., Reed, K. D. (2004). Molecular Characteristics of Nosocomial and Native American Community-Associated Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Clones from Rural Wisconsin. J. Clin. Microbiol. 42: 3752-3757 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Feil, E. J., Li, B. C., Aanensen, D. M., Hanage, W. P., Spratt, B. G. (2004). eBURST: Inferring Patterns of Evolutionary Descent among Clusters of Related Bacterial Genotypes from Multilocus Sequence Typing Data. J. Bacteriol. 186: 1518-1530 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Koreen, L., Ramaswamy, S. V., Graviss, E. A., Naidich, S., Musser, J. M., Kreiswirth, B. N. (2004). spa Typing Method for Discriminating among Staphylococcus aureus Isolates: Implications for Use of a Single Marker To Detect Genetic Micro- and Macrovariation. J. Clin. Microbiol. 42: 792-799 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Hanssen, A.-M., Kjeldsen, G., Sollid, J. U. E. (2004). Local Variants of Staphylococcal Cassette Chromosome mec in Sporadic Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus and Methicillin-Resistant Coagulase-Negative Staphylococci: Evidence of Horizontal Gene Transfer?. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother. 48: 285-296 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Robinson, D. A., Enright, M. C. (2003). Evolutionary Models of the Emergence of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother. 47: 3926-3934 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Somerville, G. A., Said-Salim, B., Wickman, J. M., Raffel, S. J., Kreiswirth, B. N., Musser, J. M. (2003). Correlation of Acetate Catabolism and Growth Yield in Staphylococcus aureus: Implications for Host-Pathogen Interactions. Infect. Immun. 71: 4724-4732 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Branger, C., Gardye, C., Galdbart, J.-O., Deschamps, C., Lambert, N. (2003). Genetic Relationship between Methicillin-Sensitive and Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Strains from France and from International Sources: Delineation of Genomic Groups. J. Clin. Microbiol. 41: 2946-2951 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Feil, E. J., Cooper, J. E., Grundmann, H., Robinson, D. A., Enright, M. C., Berendt, T., Peacock, S. J., Smith, J. M., Murphy, M., Spratt, B. G., Moore, C. E., Day, N. P. J. (2003). How Clonal Is Staphylococcus aureus?. J. Bacteriol. 185: 3307-3316 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Watson, J., Givney, R., Beard-Pegler, M., Rose, B., Merlino, J., Vickery, A., Gottlieb, T., Bradbury, R., Harbour, C. (2003). Comparative Analysis of Multidrug-Resistant, Non-Multidrug-Resistant, and Archaic Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Isolates from Central Sydney, Australia. J. Clin. Microbiol. 41: 867-872 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Wielders, C. L. C., Fluit, A. C., Brisse, S., Verhoef, J., Schmitz, F. J. (2002). mecA Gene Is Widely Disseminated in Staphylococcus aureus Population. J. Clin. Microbiol. 40: 3970-3975 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Enright, M. C., Robinson, D. A., Randle, G., Feil, E. J., Grundmann, H., Spratt, B. G. (2002). The evolutionary history of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 99: 7687-7692 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Groom, A. V., Wolsey, D. H., Naimi, T. S., Smith, K., Johnson, S., Boxrud, D., Moore, K. A., Cheek, J. E. (2001). Community-Acquired Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus in a Rural American Indian Community. JAMA 286: 1201-1205 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Crisostomo, M. I., Westh, H., Tomasz, A., Chung, M., Oliveira, D. C., de Lencastre, H. (2001). The evolution of methicillin resistance in Staphylococcus aureus: Similarity of genetic backgrounds in historically early methicillin-susceptible and -resistant isolates and contemporary epidemic clones. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 10.1073/pnas.161272898v1 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Fitzgerald, J. R., Sturdevant, D. E., Mackie, S. M., Gill, S. R., Musser, J. M. (2001). Evolutionary genomics of Staphylococcus aureus: Insights into the origin of methicillin-resistant strains and the toxic shock syndrome epidemic. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 10.1073/pnas.161098098v1 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• van Belkum, A., Struelens, M., de Visser, A., Verbrugh, H., Tibayrenc, M. (2001). Role of Genomic Typing in Taxonomy, Evolutionary Genetics, and Microbial Epidemiology. Clin. Microbiol. Rev. 14: 547-560 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Petinaki, E., Arvaniti, A., Dimitracopoulos, G., Spiliopoulou, I. (2001). Detection of mecA, mecR1 and mecI genes among clinical isolates of methicillin-resistant staphylococci by combined polymerase chain reactions. J Antimicrob Chemother 47: 297-304 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Booth, M. C., Pence, L. M., Mahasreshti, P., Callegan, M. C., Gilmore, M. S. (2001). Clonal Associations among Staphylococcus aureus Isolates from Various Sites of Infection. Infect. Immun. 69: 345-352 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• van Leeuwen, W., van Nieuwenhuizen, W., Gijzen, C., Verbrugh, H., van Belkum, A. (2000). Population Studies of Methicillin-Resistant and -Sensitive Staphylococcus aureus Strains Reveal a Lack of Variability in the agrD Gene, Encoding a Staphylococcal Autoinducer Peptide. J. Bacteriol. 182: 5721-5729 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Zadoks, R., van Leeuwen, W., Barkema, H., Sampimon, O., Verbrugh, H., Schukken, Y. H., van Belkum, A. (2000). Application of Pulsed-Field Gel Electrophoresis and Binary Typing as Tools in Veterinary Clinical Microbiology and Molecular Epidemiologic Analysis of Bovine and Human Staphylococcus aureus Isolates. J. Clin. Microbiol. 38: 1931-1939 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Enright, M. C., Day, N. P. J., Davies, C. E., Peacock, S. J., Spratt, B. G. (2000). Multilocus Sequence Typing for Characterization of Methicillin-Resistant and Methicillin-Susceptible Clones of Staphylococcus aureus. J. Clin. Microbiol. 38: 1008-1015 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Shopsin, B., Gomez, M., Montgomery, S. O., Smith, D. H., Waddington, M., Dodge, D. E., Bost, D. A., Riehman, M., Naidich, S., Kreiswirth, B. N. (1999). Evaluation of Protein A Gene Polymorphic Region DNA Sequencing for Typing of Staphylococcus aureus Strains. J. Clin. Microbiol. 37: 3556-3563 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• van Leeuwen, W., Verbrugh, H., van der Velden, J., van Leeuwen, N., Heck, M., van Belkum, A. (1999). Validation of Binary Typing for Staphylococcus aureus Strains. J. Clin. Microbiol. 37: 664-674 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Lowy, F. D. (1998). Staphylococcus aureus Infections. NEJM 339: 520-532 [Full Text]  
• Givney, R., Vickery, A., Holliday, A., Pegler, M., Benn, R. (1998). Evolution of an Endemic Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Population in an Australian Hospital from 1967 to 1996. J. Clin. Microbiol. 36: 552-556 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Jackow, C. M., Cather, J. C., Hearne, V., Asano, A. T., Musser, J. M., Duvic, M. (1997). Association of Erythrodermic Cutaneous T-Cell Lymphoma, Superantigen-Positive Staphylococcus aureus, and Oligoclonal T-Cell Receptor Vbeta Gene Expansion. Blood 89: 32-40 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Spratt, B. (1994). Resistance to antibiotics mediated by target alterations. Science 264: 388-393 [Abstract]  
• Kreiswirth, B, Kornblum, J, Arbeit, R., Eisner, W, Maslow, J., McGeer, A, Low, D., Novick, R. (1993). Evidence for a clonal origin of methicillin resistance in Staphylococcus aureus. Science 259: 227-230 [Abstract]  
• Fitzgerald, J. R., Sturdevant, D. E., Mackie, S. M., Gill, S. R., Musser, J. M. (2001). Evolutionary genomics of Staphylococcus aureus: Insights into the origin of methicillin-resistant strains and the toxic shock syndrome epidemic. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 98: 8821-8826 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Crisostomo, M. I., Westh, H., Tomasz, A., Chung, M., Oliveira, D. C., de Lencastre, H. (2001). The evolution of methicillin resistance in Staphylococcus aureus: Similarity of genetic backgrounds in historically early methicillin-susceptible and -resistant isolates and contemporary epidemic clones. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 98: 9865-9870 [Abstract] [Full Text]