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Genomic characterisation of an entomopathogenic strain of Serratia ureilytica in the critically endangered phasmid Dryococelus australis

Between 2014 and 2019, unexpected mortalities were observed in a colony of Dryococelus australis, an endangered stick-insect kept at the Melbourne Zoo for a breeding and conservation program. Pure cultures of Serratia spp. were obtained from the haemolymph of moribund and recently deceased individua...

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Autores principales: Allen, Joanne L., Doidge, Nicholas P., Cheng, Christina, Lynch, Michael, Crabb, Helen K., Scheerlinck, Jean-Pierre, Bushell, Rhys, Browning, Glenn F., Marenda, Marc S.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9020675/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35442959
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0265967
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author Allen, Joanne L.
Doidge, Nicholas P.
Cheng, Christina
Lynch, Michael
Crabb, Helen K.
Scheerlinck, Jean-Pierre
Bushell, Rhys
Browning, Glenn F.
Marenda, Marc S.
author_facet Allen, Joanne L.
Doidge, Nicholas P.
Cheng, Christina
Lynch, Michael
Crabb, Helen K.
Scheerlinck, Jean-Pierre
Bushell, Rhys
Browning, Glenn F.
Marenda, Marc S.
author_sort Allen, Joanne L.
collection PubMed
description Between 2014 and 2019, unexpected mortalities were observed in a colony of Dryococelus australis, an endangered stick-insect kept at the Melbourne Zoo for a breeding and conservation program. Pure cultures of Serratia spp. were obtained from the haemolymph of moribund and recently deceased individuals. The combined bacteriological and histopathological observations suggested an infectious cause of these mortalities. Genotyping of Serratia sp. isolated from the insects and their environment revealed a predominant strain profile. A representative isolate, AM923, was entirely sequenced and compared to 616 publicly available Serratia spp. genomes, including 37 associated with insects. The genomes were distributed into 3 distinct groups, with 63% of the insect-associated isolates within a single clade (clade A) containing AM923, separated from most environmental/plant-associated strains (clade B) and human isolates (clade C). Average nucleotide identity and phylogenetic analyses identified AM923 as S. ureilytica and revealed similarities with putatively entomopathogenic strains. An experimental infection model in honey bees (Apis mellifera) confirmed the pathogenic potential of AM923. A urease operon was found in most insect isolates and a PCR assay, based on the ureB gene sequence, was used to confirm the presence of AM923 in experimentally infected bees. This species-specific PCR could be applied to detect entomopathogenic Serratia spp. in infected insects or their environment.
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spelling pubmed-90206752022-04-21 Genomic characterisation of an entomopathogenic strain of Serratia ureilytica in the critically endangered phasmid Dryococelus australis Allen, Joanne L. Doidge, Nicholas P. Cheng, Christina Lynch, Michael Crabb, Helen K. Scheerlinck, Jean-Pierre Bushell, Rhys Browning, Glenn F. Marenda, Marc S. PLoS One Research Article Between 2014 and 2019, unexpected mortalities were observed in a colony of Dryococelus australis, an endangered stick-insect kept at the Melbourne Zoo for a breeding and conservation program. Pure cultures of Serratia spp. were obtained from the haemolymph of moribund and recently deceased individuals. The combined bacteriological and histopathological observations suggested an infectious cause of these mortalities. Genotyping of Serratia sp. isolated from the insects and their environment revealed a predominant strain profile. A representative isolate, AM923, was entirely sequenced and compared to 616 publicly available Serratia spp. genomes, including 37 associated with insects. The genomes were distributed into 3 distinct groups, with 63% of the insect-associated isolates within a single clade (clade A) containing AM923, separated from most environmental/plant-associated strains (clade B) and human isolates (clade C). Average nucleotide identity and phylogenetic analyses identified AM923 as S. ureilytica and revealed similarities with putatively entomopathogenic strains. An experimental infection model in honey bees (Apis mellifera) confirmed the pathogenic potential of AM923. A urease operon was found in most insect isolates and a PCR assay, based on the ureB gene sequence, was used to confirm the presence of AM923 in experimentally infected bees. This species-specific PCR could be applied to detect entomopathogenic Serratia spp. in infected insects or their environment. Public Library of Science 2022-04-20 /pmc/articles/PMC9020675/ /pubmed/35442959 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0265967 Text en © 2022 Allen et al https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Allen, Joanne L.
Doidge, Nicholas P.
Cheng, Christina
Lynch, Michael
Crabb, Helen K.
Scheerlinck, Jean-Pierre
Bushell, Rhys
Browning, Glenn F.
Marenda, Marc S.
Genomic characterisation of an entomopathogenic strain of Serratia ureilytica in the critically endangered phasmid Dryococelus australis
title Genomic characterisation of an entomopathogenic strain of Serratia ureilytica in the critically endangered phasmid Dryococelus australis
title_full Genomic characterisation of an entomopathogenic strain of Serratia ureilytica in the critically endangered phasmid Dryococelus australis
title_fullStr Genomic characterisation of an entomopathogenic strain of Serratia ureilytica in the critically endangered phasmid Dryococelus australis
title_full_unstemmed Genomic characterisation of an entomopathogenic strain of Serratia ureilytica in the critically endangered phasmid Dryococelus australis
title_short Genomic characterisation of an entomopathogenic strain of Serratia ureilytica in the critically endangered phasmid Dryococelus australis
title_sort genomic characterisation of an entomopathogenic strain of serratia ureilytica in the critically endangered phasmid dryococelus australis
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9020675/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35442959
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0265967
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