Alexander Mellmann

..BURP clustering of the resulting 66 spa types was highly concordant with multilocus sequence typing (96.5% concordance) and pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (94.9%)...

..To investigate genetic changes in EHEC during the course of human infection, we analyzed consecutive stool samples and shed isolates from patients with HUS, focusing on the genes encoding Shiga toxin (stx) and intimin (eae)...

..BURP was subsequently evaluated with a strain collection reflecting the breadth of diversity of S. aureus (JCM 2002; 40:4544)...

..The ability to recycle stx(2), a critical virulence trait, makes SF E. coli O157:NM strains ephemeral EHEC that can exist as stx-negative variants during certain phases of their life cycle...

..Thus, MALDI-TOF MS-based species identification of nonfermenting bacteria provided accurate and reproducible results within 10 min without any substantial costs for consumables...

..1% of these strains clustered in 5 STs. From all STs and serotypes identified, we established a reference panel of EHEC associated with HUS (HUSEC collection)...

..In this study we evaluated protein A ( spa) gene repeat sequence analysis for MRSA typing in a hospital...

..75% interlaboratory reproducibility. Only 6 of the 480 samples were misidentified due to interchanges (4 samples) or contamination (1 sample) or not identified because of insufficient signal intensity (1 sample)...

..We identified 10 specific sequence types (ST) and 4 distinct clonal groups. ST442 was significantly associated with hemolytic uremic syndrome...

..coli and cause diarrhea worldwide. However, it is unknown whether there are bacterial lineage-specific human disease phenotypes. We compared stx-/EAF- AEEC recovered from patients (mostly children) with bloody and nonbloody diarrhea...

..However, the frequency of stx-negative/eae-positive E. coli in stools of HUS patients and the clinical significance of such strains are unknown...

..The divergence within EHEC O111 makes it possible to subtype these emerging pathogens in the laboratory thereby providing a basis for further investigations into their ecological niches and survival capabilities...

..coli O157-infected patients. It is unknown if loss of the stx gene during the early stage of an enterohemorrhagic E. coli infection prevents HUS, or if absence of the stx gene from E. coli O157 reduces or ablates virulence...

..We analysed virulence profiles and relevant phenotypes of outbreak isolates recovered in our laboratory...

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..We propose two possible evolutionary scenarios for eibG in STEC: a clonal development of eibG in strains with the same phylogenetic background or horizontal transfer of eibG between phylogenetically unrelated STEC strains...

..The suggested occurrence of this process in the human intestine has diagnostic, clinical, epidemiological, and evolutionary implications...

..The variability of PFGE patterns for the progeny of a single colony must be considered when interpreting PFGE patterns in SF EHEC O157-associated outbreaks...

..CONCLUSIONS: Rapid MRSA outbreak detection, based on epidemiological and spa typing data, is a suitable alternative for classical approaches and can assist in the identification of potential sources of infection...

..The reasons for the convergence of pathogenic EHEC strains on a suite of virulence loci remain unknown...

..None of the other stool samples was positive by the sfpA PCR; 59 of these stool samples contained EHEC O157:H7. The sfpA gene can be recommended as a target for screening for SF E. coli O157:H-...

..The presence of proteolytically active EspP in EHEC serogroups O157, O26, O111, and O145, which are bona fide human pathogens, suggests that EspP might play a role as an EHEC virulence factor...

..Spontaneous deletions affecting Tel(R) OIs contribute to EHEC O157 genome plasticity and might impair virulence and/or fitness...

..Interestingly, most strains were enteroaggregative E. coli (EAEC) strains, followed by atypical EPEC (ATEC) strains. Classical enteropathogenic E. coli (EPEC) strains were not detected...

..Our data demonstrate that E. coli isolates producing Shiga toxin 2e have imported specific virulence and fitness determinants which allow them to adapt to the specific hosts in which they cause various forms of disease...

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..Specific MLVA profiles with an evolutionary persistence were identified, particularly within sorbitol-fermenting EHEC O157:H-.These pathogens belonged to the same MLVA cluster. Our findings indicate successful persistence of this clone...

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..In conclusion, pre-admission screening for MRSA is an effective method to reduce the hospital burden of MRSA-colonized patients and the savings due to consistent decolonization before elective admission outweigh the costs of screening...

..Moreover, animal reservoirs are increasingly considered to represent an important source of human MRSA acquisition. In this review article the authors describe the current epidemiological situation of MRSA in Germany...

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..In contrast to phenotypic methods and the NCBI database, the novel high-quality RIDOM sequence database provides excellent identification of staphylococci, including rarely isolated species and phenotypic variants...

..The intensive study of human enteric factors that induce or modulate pathogen chromosome instability could provide important information about host-microbial interactions...

..Although MLVA--like MLST--was highly discriminatory (index of diversity, 0.988 versus 0.984), a low level of concordance demonstrated the limited ability of MLVA to reflect long-term evolutionary events...

..In conclusion, rapid next-generation technologies facilitated prospective whole genome characterization in the early stages of an outbreak...

..In patients lacking all risk factors assessed, spa types t011 and t034 were predominant (P<0.001)...

..aureus DNA samples sent to 10 laboratories. Specialized software for automated sequence analysis ensured a common typing nomenclature...

..The purpose of this study was to evaluate the microbiologic contamination and time efficiency associated with routine clinical use of single-use prefilled disposable syringes for contrast administration...

..The purpose of this study was to evaluate in an experimental setting and in clinical routine the risk of microbiologic contamination of the syringes of injectors used to administer contrast agent and saline solution for MDCT...

..Independent mutational events were observed eight times in 142 isolates: four deletions, two duplications of repeats, and two point mutations...

..The silencing of urease expression could not be linked to a stop codon in ureD. The frequent occurrence of ure genes in eae-positive STEC isolates makes them valuable markers for virulence...

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..Due to differences in the results of physiological and chemotaxonomic investigations and DNA-DNA hybridization data, strain A6664 was not included in the description of the novel species...

..The RIDOM service (http://www.ridom-rdna.de/) is in the process of making available a comprehensive and high-quality database for bacterial identification purposes and provides excellent results for the majority of Nocardia isolates...

..This database correctly identified 55 clinical staphylococcal isolates; all were correctly identified at the species level. At the subspecies level, rpoB misidentified only 2 isolates...

..We propose the designation of Acinetobacter septicus sp. nov. for these isolates, with isolate AK001 as the type strain...

..886 (by multilocus sequence typing). Cross-classification gave 94.77 or 95.82% (PFGE-flaA or PFGE-flaB) concordance. flaA was overdiscriminatory in three cases, most probably due to intragenomic recombination...

..In contrast, the spa type-deduced multilocus sequence typing clonal complex (MLST-CC) was not able to predict the invasiveness of MRSA strains equally well. The underlying mechanism remains to be elucidated...