Genomic signatures of human and animal disease in the zoonotic pathogen Streptococcus suis

• Published in: Nature communications Vol. 6; no. 1; p. 6740
• Main Authors: Weinert, Lucy A., Chaudhuri, Roy R., Wang, Jinhong, Peters, Sarah E., Corander, Jukka, Jombart, Thibaut, Baig, Abiyad, Howell, Kate J., Vehkala, Minna, Välimäki, Niko, Harris, David, Chieu, Tran Thi Bich, Van Vinh Chau, Nguyen, Campbell, James, Schultsz, Constance, Parkhill, Julian, Bentley, Stephen D., Langford, Paul R., Rycroft, Andrew N., Wren, Brendan W., Farrar, Jeremy, Baker, Stephen, Hoa, Ngo Thi, Holden, Matthew T.G., Tucker, Alexander W., Maskell, Duncan J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 31.03.2015; Nature Publishing Group
• Subjects: 631/1647/2217/2138; 631/208/325/2482; 631/250/255/1318; 631/326/41/2529; Animal diseases; Animals; College campuses; Epidemics; Epidemiology; Genetic Variation; Genomes; Genomics; Hogs; Hospitals; Humanities and Social Sciences; Humans; Meningitis; multidisciplinary; Pathogens; Public health; Respiratory diseases; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Staphylococcus infections; Streptococcal Infections - microbiology; Streptococcal Infections - veterinary; Streptococcus suis - genetics; Streptococcus suis - pathogenicity; Sus scrofa; Swine - microbiology; Swine Diseases - microbiology; Systemic diseases; Tropical diseases; United Kingdom; Veterinary medicine; Vietnam; Virulence; Virulence Factors - genetics; Zoonoses; United Kingdom > UK; Vietnam; Finland
• ISSN: 2041-1723; 2041-1723
• DOI: 10.1038/ncomms7740

Streptococcus suis causes disease in pigs worldwide and is increasingly implicated in zoonotic disease in East and South-East Asia. To understand the genetic basis of disease in S. suis , we study the genomes of 375 isolates with detailed clinical phenotypes from pigs and humans from the United Kingdom and Vietnam. Here, we show that isolates associated with disease contain substantially fewer genes than non-clinical isolates, but are more likely to encode virulence factors. Human disease isolates are limited to a single-virulent population, originating in the 1920, s when pig production was intensified, but no consistent genomic differences between pig and human isolates are observed. There is little geographical clustering of different S. suis subpopulations, and the bacterium undergoes high rates of recombination, implying that an increase in virulence anywhere in the world could have a global impact over a short timescale. The bacterium Streptococcus suis causes respiratory tract infections in pigs and meningitis in humans. Here, the authors show that human disease isolates are limited to a single virulent population and find no consistent genomic differences between pig and human isolates.