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Ubiquitous Conjugative Mega-Plasmids of Acinetobacter Species and Their Role in Horizontal Transfer of Multi-Drug Resistance

Conjugative mega-plasmids play a special role in adaptation since they carry a huge number of accessory genes, often allowing the host to develop in new niches. In addition, due to conjugation they are able to effectively spread themselves and participate in the transfer of small mobilizable plasmid...

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Autores principales: Mindlin, Sofia, Maslova, Olga, Beletsky, Alexey, Nurmukanova, Varvara, Zong, Zhiyong, Mardanov, Andrey, Petrova, Mayya
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8490738/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34621254
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2021.728644
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author Mindlin, Sofia
Maslova, Olga
Beletsky, Alexey
Nurmukanova, Varvara
Zong, Zhiyong
Mardanov, Andrey
Petrova, Mayya
author_facet Mindlin, Sofia
Maslova, Olga
Beletsky, Alexey
Nurmukanova, Varvara
Zong, Zhiyong
Mardanov, Andrey
Petrova, Mayya
author_sort Mindlin, Sofia
collection PubMed
description Conjugative mega-plasmids play a special role in adaptation since they carry a huge number of accessory genes, often allowing the host to develop in new niches. In addition, due to conjugation they are able to effectively spread themselves and participate in the transfer of small mobilizable plasmids. In this work, we present a detailed characterization of a recently discovered family of multiple-drug resistance mega-plasmids of Acinetobacter species, termed group III-4a. We describe the structure of the plasmid backbone region, identify the rep gene and the origin of plasmid replication, and show that plasmids from this group are able not only to move between different Acinetobacter species but also to efficiently mobilize small plasmids containing different mob genes. Furthermore, we show that the population of natural Acinetobacter strains contains a significant number of mega-plasmids and reveal a clear correlation between the living conditions of Acinetobacter strains and the structure of their mega-plasmids. In particular, comparison of the plasmids from environmental and clinical strains shows that the genes for resistance to heavy metals were eliminated in the latter, with the simultaneous accumulation of antibiotic resistance genes by incorporation of transposons and integrons carrying these genes. The results demonstrate that this group of mega-plasmids plays a key role in the dissemination of multi-drug resistance among Acinetobacter species.
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spelling pubmed-84907382021-10-06 Ubiquitous Conjugative Mega-Plasmids of Acinetobacter Species and Their Role in Horizontal Transfer of Multi-Drug Resistance Mindlin, Sofia Maslova, Olga Beletsky, Alexey Nurmukanova, Varvara Zong, Zhiyong Mardanov, Andrey Petrova, Mayya Front Microbiol Microbiology Conjugative mega-plasmids play a special role in adaptation since they carry a huge number of accessory genes, often allowing the host to develop in new niches. In addition, due to conjugation they are able to effectively spread themselves and participate in the transfer of small mobilizable plasmids. In this work, we present a detailed characterization of a recently discovered family of multiple-drug resistance mega-plasmids of Acinetobacter species, termed group III-4a. We describe the structure of the plasmid backbone region, identify the rep gene and the origin of plasmid replication, and show that plasmids from this group are able not only to move between different Acinetobacter species but also to efficiently mobilize small plasmids containing different mob genes. Furthermore, we show that the population of natural Acinetobacter strains contains a significant number of mega-plasmids and reveal a clear correlation between the living conditions of Acinetobacter strains and the structure of their mega-plasmids. In particular, comparison of the plasmids from environmental and clinical strains shows that the genes for resistance to heavy metals were eliminated in the latter, with the simultaneous accumulation of antibiotic resistance genes by incorporation of transposons and integrons carrying these genes. The results demonstrate that this group of mega-plasmids plays a key role in the dissemination of multi-drug resistance among Acinetobacter species. Frontiers Media S.A. 2021-09-21 /pmc/articles/PMC8490738/ /pubmed/34621254 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2021.728644 Text en Copyright © 2021 Mindlin, Maslova, Beletsky, Nurmukanova, Zong, Mardanov and Petrova. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Microbiology
Mindlin, Sofia
Maslova, Olga
Beletsky, Alexey
Nurmukanova, Varvara
Zong, Zhiyong
Mardanov, Andrey
Petrova, Mayya
Ubiquitous Conjugative Mega-Plasmids of Acinetobacter Species and Their Role in Horizontal Transfer of Multi-Drug Resistance
title Ubiquitous Conjugative Mega-Plasmids of Acinetobacter Species and Their Role in Horizontal Transfer of Multi-Drug Resistance
title_full Ubiquitous Conjugative Mega-Plasmids of Acinetobacter Species and Their Role in Horizontal Transfer of Multi-Drug Resistance
title_fullStr Ubiquitous Conjugative Mega-Plasmids of Acinetobacter Species and Their Role in Horizontal Transfer of Multi-Drug Resistance
title_full_unstemmed Ubiquitous Conjugative Mega-Plasmids of Acinetobacter Species and Their Role in Horizontal Transfer of Multi-Drug Resistance
title_short Ubiquitous Conjugative Mega-Plasmids of Acinetobacter Species and Their Role in Horizontal Transfer of Multi-Drug Resistance
title_sort ubiquitous conjugative mega-plasmids of acinetobacter species and their role in horizontal transfer of multi-drug resistance
topic Microbiology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8490738/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34621254
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fmicb.2021.728644
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