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Characterization of the relationship between polar and lateral flagellar genes in clinical Aeromonas dhakensis: phenotypic, genetic and biochemical analyses

  • Bacterial, Fungal and Virus Molecular Biology - Research Paper
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Abstract

Flagellar-mediated motility is a crucial virulence factor in many bacterial species. A dual flagellar system has been described in aeromonads; however, there is no flagella-related study in the emergent human pathogen Aeromonas dhakensis. Using 46 clinical A. dhakensis, phenotypic motility, genotypic characteristics (flagellar genes and sequence types), biochemical properties and their relationship were investigated in this study. All 46 strains showed swimming motility at 30 °C in 0.3% Bacto agar and carried the most prevalent 6 polar flagellar genes cheA, flgE, flgG, flgH, flgL, and flgN. On the contrary, only 18 strains (39%) demonstrated swarming motility on 0.5% Eiken agar at 30 °C and they harbored 11 lateral flagellar genes lafB, lafK, lafS, lafT, lafU, flgCL, flgGL, flgNL, fliEL, fliFL, and fliGL. No association was found between biochemical properties and motility phenotypes. Interestingly, a significant association between swarming and strains isolated from pus was observed (p = 0.0171). Three strains 187, 277, and 289 isolated from pus belonged to novel sequence types (ST522 and ST524) exhibited fast swimming and swarming profiles, and they harbored > 90% of the flagellar genes tested. Our findings provide a fundamental understanding of flagellar-mediated motility in A. dhakensis.

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Funding

This work was supported by the University of Malaya Research grant (UMRG RP039B-15HTM).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biomedical Science, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya, 50603, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

    Tien-Tien Vicky Lau, Suat-Moi Puah, S. D. Puthucheary & Kek-Heng Chua

  2. Academy of Sciences Malaysia, 50480, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

    Jin-Ai Mary Anne Tan

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Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments, SMP and KHC; conducted the experiments and wrote the original manuscript, TTVL; contributed supplied materials, KHC, JAMAT, and SDP; data collection, analyzed the data, and edited the original manuscript, TTVL and SMP; supervised and revised the manuscript, KHC, SMP, JAMAT, and SDP. All authors have read and agreed to the published article.

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Correspondence to Kek-Heng Chua.

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Lau, TT.V., Puah, SM., Tan, JA.M.A. et al. Characterization of the relationship between polar and lateral flagellar genes in clinical Aeromonas dhakensis: phenotypic, genetic and biochemical analyses. Braz J Microbiol 52, 517–529 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42770-021-00457-8

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