Previous Article | Next Article ![]()
Applied and Environmental Microbiology, June 2006, p. 4464-4471, Vol. 72, No. 6
0099-2240/06/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/AEM.02843-05
Copyright © 2006, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
| SHORT REPORT |
Food Safety and Quality National Program, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada Research Centre, 5403 1st Avenue S, Lethbridge, Alberta, T1J 4B1, Canada,1 Charles River Laboratories, Tranent, Edinburgh EH33 2NE, United Kingdom,2 Bayer HealthCare AG, Animal Health Division, 51368 Leverkusen, Germany3
Received 2 December 2005/ Accepted 4 April 2006
|
|
|---|
99% similarity). Species-specific PCR indicated that all of the isolates were H. canadensis isolates. Although the appearance of the porcine isolates was similar to the appearance of H. canadensis, only one of these isolates was able to hydrolyze indoxyl acetate, a cardinal characteristic of this taxon. Examination of the 23S rRNA and hsp60 genes revealed high levels of similarity between the porcine isolates and H. canadensis. However, amplified fragment length polymorphism genomic typing showed that isolates recovered from swine feces were genetically distinct from H. canadensis strains obtained from humans and geese. |
|
|---|
During a study to assess the antimicrobial susceptibilities of zoonotic and commensal bacteria obtained from food-producing animals in Europe (3), a number of colonies typical of fastidious Campylobacter species were isolated from porcine feces after 48 h of incubation on modified charcoal cefoperazone desoxycholate agar containing a supplement of cefoperazone and amphotericin B at 42°C in a microaerophilic atmosphere consisting of 5% O2, 10% CO2, 2% H2, and 83% N2. The cells were found to be small motile bacilli, were oxidase positive, and produced no acid or gas on triple sugar iron or Kigler-Hajna medium. Based on these characteristics, they were presumptively identified as Campylobacter. Further characterization indicated that the isolates exhibited anomalous resistance to nalidixic acid (MIC range, 16 to 128 µg ml1) compared to the resistance of Campylobacter jejuni, Campylobacter coli, and Campylobacter hyointestinalis, although all isolates were susceptible to ciprofloxacin. Furthermore, the isolates were not campylobacters as determined by genus- or species-specific PCR (10).
To identify the isolates, the nearly complete 16S rRNA gene of 12 isolates from porcine feces (L166, L172, L178, L179, L180, L184, L219, L222, L223, L227, L229, and L231) was amplified and sequenced. All sequences were compared directly with the NCBI GenBank nonredundant nucleotide database using BLASTN. Subsequently, the nucleotide sequences of the isolates recovered from swine were analyzed using programs in the PHYLIP phylogenetic software. Phylogenetic estimates were obtained based on the neighbor-joining distance method. BLASTN analysis indicated that there was a very high degree of sequence similarity with H. canadensis, and all 12 isolates formed a robust clade with H. canadensis strains isolated from humans and geese (Fig. 1). For 11 of the isolates, the 16S rRNA gene sequence similarity with the type strain of H. canadensis (strain ATCC 700968) was
99% (one to three base substitutions). This level of similarity was higher than that observed by Tee et al. (23) for a strain of H. canadensis recovered from an Australian man suffering from bacteremia (isolate W. Tee-Cro) (26 base substitutions). Interestingly, L222 recovered from a Danish pig was found to form a clade with W. Tee-Cro (75% bootstrap support), but there were only 12 base differences between it and the type strain of H. canadensis (Fig. 1). A level of similarity of less than 97% in the 16S rRNA gene sequence is typically used to underpin most proposals for new species (5). The high levels of similarity for the 16S rRNA gene between H. canadensis and the Helicobacter strains from swine that we observed indicated that the porcine isolates are H. canadensis. Furthermore, the 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis indicated that isolates obtained from porcine feces were clearly not members of species of Helicobacter previously recovered from swine (e.g., H. pametensis, H. rappini, H. trogontum, and "Candidatus H. suis").
![]() View larger version (34K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 1. Dendrogram based on a majority-rule consensus tree obtained by analyzing the partial 16S rRNA gene of selected porcine Helicobacter isolates (designations beginning with L) using the NEIGHBOR program (neighbor-joining option) of PHYLIP. The outgroup used in the analysis was Wolinella succinogenes. Helicobacter isolates obtained from porcine feces were recovered in The Netherlands (NLD) or Denmark (DNK), and isolate L184 was indoxyl acetate hydrolysis positive. All other helicobacters are indicated by their taxonomic names, NCBI accession numbers (in parentheses), and isolate designations (in brackets). Type strains are indicated by "T." H. trogontum from swine (indicated by superscript "1") was originally described as Helicobacter sp. (Flexispira taxon 1), and H. pametensis (indicated by superscript "2") was originally described as Helicobacter sp. in the NCBI database. The bar indicates 0.01 nucleotide substitution per base, and the numbers at nodes indicate the support for the internal branches of the tree obtained by bootstrap analysis (percentages of 1,000 bootstraps). The asterisk indicates a node that has a bootstrap value of 65%.
|
|
View this table: [in a new window] |
TABLE 1. Primer information
|
|
View this table: [in a new window] |
TABLE 2. Sources of porcine Helicobacter isolates and Helicobacter reference strains, and results of physiological tests and PCRa
|
All porcine isolates formed shiny, gray, translucent to opaque, smooth colonies that were 0.3 to 0.8 mm in diameter on Karmali agar and charcoal cefoperazone desoxycholate agar at 40°C after 48 h. Growth on the former medium was superior. The growth on 5% sheep blood agar was similar to the growth on Karmali agar. None of the isolates were hemolytic, able to grow in the presence of 2.0% or 3.5% (wt/vol) NaCl at 40°C, or produced acid, gas, or H2S in triple sugar iron agar. For many of the isolates, the growth on Columbia agar (50%) and Mueller-Hinton agar (93%) without blood was reduced compared with the growth on Karmali agar. About 15 to 25% of the colonies on Karmali agar swarmed. All isolates were microaerophilic and thermophilic and able to grow well at 40°C and 42°C. Under microaerophilic conditions, no isolates grew at 25°C, restricted growth of some isolates (45%) occurred at 30°C, and all isolates grew at 35°C. All isolates also grew under anaerobic conditions, and detectible growth was observed for some isolates (33%) under aerobic conditions at 40°C on Karmali agar (first transfer). The results of physiological tests for Helicobacter species (4) are shown in Table 2. With the exception of indoxyl acetate hydrolysis, all of the results were consistent with the original description of the four H. canadensis strains described by Fox et al. (7). Hydrolysis of indoxyl acetate is considered a cardinal physiological characteristic of H. canadensis (7, 24). However, the inability of the vast majority (98%) of the Helicobacter isolates from swine to utilize indoxyl acetate raised questions concerning their identity as H. canadensis isolates and/or concerning the robustness of this characteristic to distinguish H. canadensis from H. pullorum; only four and seven isolates of H. canadensis were examined by Fox et al. (7) and Waldenström et al. (24), respectively. Interestingly, we observed that one of the porcine isolates was able to hydrolyze indoxyl acetate. Although weak reactions do occur with some strains belonging to positive taxa, indoxyl acetate utilization is considered to be a constant characteristic of many Campylobacter and Helicobacter species (15, 18). However, On et al. (16) noted that a small number of isolates of Campylobacter lari, an indoxyl acetate-negative taxon, were positive for indoxyl acetate hydrolysis. Consistent with the original description of H. canadensis strains isolated from humans (7), none of the porcine isolates of Helicobacter were able to hydrolyze alkaline phosphatase. This contrasted with the strains of H. canadensis isolated from geese in Sweden and the United Kingdom (24). Furthermore, we observed that all 42 Helicobacter isolates recovered from porcine feces were urease negative. Gastric Helicobacter species are typically urease positive (21), suggesting that the intestines are the primary niche occupied by the isolates of Helicobacter recovered from porcine feces.
Given the anomalous indoxyl acetate results for the porcine Helicobacter isolates, representative isolates were examined further morphologically and genetically (targeting the 23S rRNA and hsp60 genes). Cells of isolates recovered from swine (L172, L178, L179, L184, and L222), H. canadensis ATCC BAA-439, and H. pullorum ATCC 51801 were examined with a transmission electron microscope. Cells that were 48 h old were fixed in 2% glutaraldehyde and examined with an Hitachi H-7100 microscope operated at 30 kV. Helicobacter isolates from swine were spirillum shaped, and all taxa produced cells that possessed bipolar flagella, although some cells were uniflagellar (Fig. 2). The flagella were sheathed, and no periplasmic fibers were observed. Cells were 2.14 to 3.18 µm long and 0.36 to 0.59 µm wide. The morphology and dimensions of Helicobacter isolates from swine were similar to the morphology and dimensions of the H. canadensis reference strain examined and different from the morphology and dimensions of the H. pullorum reference strain since this taxon produces uniflagellar cells exclusively (22).
![]() View larger version (53K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 2. Negatively stained transmission electron micrographs of Helicobacter isolates recovered from porcine feces. (A) L178. Note the bipolar flagella. (B) L172. Although the flagella of most cells were bipolar, some uniflagellar cells also were observed. The black arrow indicates a sheathed flagellum, and the white arrow indicates the lack of periplasmic fibers on the surface of cells. Bars = 500 nm.
|
![]() View larger version (33K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 3. Dendrogram based on a majority-rule consensus tree obtained by analyzing the partial 23S rRNA gene of selected porcine Helicobacter isolates (designations beginning with L). The outgroup used in the analysis was Wolinella succinogenes. All four of the porcine isolates of Helicobacter included in the analysis were recovered in The Netherlands (NLD). Isolate L184 was indoxyl acetate hydrolysis positive. All other helicobacters are indicated by their taxonomic names, NCBI accession numbers (in parentheses), and isolate designations (in brackets). Type strains are indicated by "T." The bar indicates 0.01 nucleotide substitution per base, and the numbers at nodes indicate the support for the internal branches of the tree obtained by bootstrap analysis (percentages of 1,000 bootstraps).
|
![]() View larger version (26K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 4. Dendrogram based on a majority-rule consensus tree obtained by analyzing the partial hsp60 gene of selected porcine Helicobacter isolates (designations beginning with L). The outgroup used in the analysis was Campylobacter jejuni. Isolate L222 was isolated from porcine feces in Denmark (DNK). The other three porcine isolates included in the analysis were recovered in The Netherlands (NLD). Isolate L184 was indoxyl acetate hydrolysis positive. All other helicobacters are indicated by their taxonomic names, NCBI accession numbers (in parentheses), and isolate designations (in brackets). The bar indicates 0.05 nucleotide substitution per base, and the numbers at nodes indicate the support for the internal branches of the tree obtained by bootstrap analysis (percentages of 1,000 bootstraps).
|
90% similar). The four isolates recovered from Denmark formed a clade with an isolate (L235) from The Netherlands. For other isolates, there were no clear trends for genetic similarity and location of isolation. However, in some instances, isolates that were from the same location and were isolated at similar times formed clades (e.g., isolates L185 and L186 and isolates L229 and L230).
![]() View larger version (20K): [in a new window] |
FIG. 5. Unweighted-pair group method using average linkages dendrogram of AFLP fingerprints from 41 Helicobacter isolates recovered from swine (designations beginning with L), five reference strains of H. canadensis, and one reference strain each of H. pullorum and H. pylori. Isolate designations not preceded by a taxon name are isolates obtained from swine in The Netherlands or Denmark. Isolates indicated by an asterisk were collected in Denmark. The bar indicates percentages of genetic similarity. The vertical dotted line represents isolates that are 90% similar in terms of banding patterns and thus are similar or closely related.
|
99% similarity to the 16S rRNA and 23S rRNA gene sequences of H. canadensis, indicating the bacteria from swine were H. canadensis sensu stricto. However, only 1 of the 42 porcine isolates was able to hydrolyze indoxyl acetate, a cardinal physiological characteristic that distinguishes H. canadensis from H. pullorum. Furthermore, typing of the isolates indicated that they were genetically distinct from H. canadensis strains obtained from humans and geese, raising questions about the taxonomic status of the porcine H. canadensis isolates. A detailed examination of the taxonomy of H. pullorum and H. canadensis is warranted, and in particular, whether the porcine H. canadensis isolates represent a distinct taxonomic entity, such as a subspecies or genomospecies (1), needs to be resolved. The fact that swine in both Denmark and The Netherlands (various locations) were positive for H. canadensis suggests that this bacterium is widespread in northern Europe, and studies that examine its association with swine and the prevalence at which cells are shed in porcine feces and subsequently contaminate pork also are warranted. Furthermore, the high density of swine production throughout the world, including Europe, coupled with the emerging pathogen status of H. canadensis, emphasizes the need to determine whether porcine strains of this bacterium are a health concern for humans. |
|
|---|
Contribution 05018 from the Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada Research Centre, Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada. ![]()
|
|
|---|
This article has been cited by other articles:
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Copyright © 2009 by the American Society for Microbiology. For an alternate route to Journals.ASM.org, visit: http://intl-journals.asm.org | More Info»