Comment on “the IS6 family, a clinically important group of insertion sequences including IS26” by Varani and co-authors

The insertion sequence IS26 has long been known to play a major role in the recruitment of antibiotic resistance genes into the mobile resistance gene pool of Gram-negative bacteria and IS26 also plays a major role in their subsequent broad dissemination. Related IS, IS431/257 and IS1216 are important in the same roles in Gram positive bacteria. However, until recently the properties of IS26 movement that could potentially explain this ability had not been explored. A much needed insight has come from our recent demonstration that IS26 uses a novel targeted mechanism that is conservative. The targeted conservative mechanism is much more efficient than the known replicative mechanism, which is now more accurately called copy-in. A recent review “The IS6 family, a clinically important group of insertion sequences including IS26” by Varani, He, Siguier, Ross and Chandler published in Mobile DNA has substantially misrepresented the recent studies on the targeted conservative mechanism and at the same time incorrectly implied that any mechanism established for IS26 can be assumed to apply to a range of IS that are at best very distantly related. A few of the most important issues are examined in this comment. Readers are advised to consult the original literature to check facts before drawing firm conclusions.