Multilocus sequence typing of Mycoplasma agalactiae

• Published in: Journal of medical microbiology Vol. 60; no. 6; pp. 803 - 811
• Main Authors: MCAULIFFE, L, GOSNEY, F, HLUSEK, M, DE GARNICA, M. L, SPERGSER, J, KARGL, M, ROSENGARTEN, R, AYLING, R. D, NICHOLAS, R. A. J, ELLIS, R. J
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Reading Society for General Microbiology 01.06.2011
• Subjects: Agalactia; Animals; Bacterial Typing Techniques - methods; Bacteriology; Biological and medical sciences; Data processing; DNA topoisomerase; DNA, Bacterial - chemistry; DNA, Bacterial - genetics; Economics; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Genes, Bacterial; Genetic diversity; Genome, Bacterial; Genomes; Genotype; Geographical distribution; Goat Diseases - microbiology; Goats; Infectious diseases; Medical sciences; Microbiology; Miscellaneous; Molecular Epidemiology - methods; multilocus sequence typing; Multilocus Sequence Typing - methods; Mutation; Mycoplasma agalactiae; Mycoplasma agalactiae - classification; Mycoplasma agalactiae - genetics; Mycoplasma Infections - microbiology; Mycoplasma Infections - veterinary; Recombination; Sheep; Sheep Diseases - microbiology; Spain; Typing; Spain; Mollicutes; Mycoplasmatales; Mycoplasma agalactiae; Bacteria; Genotype; Mycoplasmataceae
• ISSN: 0022-2615; 1473-5644
• DOI: 10.1099/jmm.0.028159-0

Mycoplasma agalactiae is the main cause of contagious agalactia, a serious disease of sheep and goats, which has major clinical and economic impacts. We have developed a multilocus sequence typing (MLST) scheme using the sequenced genomes of the M. agalactiae strains PG2 and 5632. An MLST scheme based on the genes gltX, metS, gyrB, tufA and dnaA was designed and in total 3468 bp of sequence were analysed for each strain. MLST offers a highly discriminatory typing method for M. agalactiae and was capable of subdividing 53 strains into 17 distinct sequence types, largely according to geographical origin. MLST detected unexpected diversity in recent isolates from Spain, identifying two novel outliers, and enabled typing of novel Mongolian isolates for the first time. Genetic diversity in the sequenced regions was largely due to mutation, with recombination playing a much smaller role. A web-accessible database has been set up for this MLST scheme for M. agalactiae: http://pubmlst.org/magalactiae/. MLST offers a robust, objective molecular epidemiological tool for M. agalactiae that that enables interlaboratory comparison of data.