Adherence to and Invasion of Human Intestinal Cells by Arcobacter Species and Their Virulence Genotypes

Abstract

bThe genus Arcobacter is composed of 17 species which have been isolated from various sources. Of particular interest are A. butzleri, A. cryaerophilus, and A. skirrowii, as these have been associated with human cases of diarrhea, the probable transmission routes being through the ingestion of contaminated drinking water and food. To date, only limited studies of virulence traits in this genus have been undertaken. The present study used 60 Arcobacter strains isolated from different sources, representing 16 of the 17 species of the genus, to investigate their ability to adhere to and invade the human intestinal cell line Caco-2. In addition, the presence of five putative virulence genes (ciaB, cadF, cj1349, hecA, and irgA) was screened for in these strains by PCR. All Arcobacter species except A. bivalviorum and Arcobacter sp. strain W63 adhered to Caco-2 cells, and most species (10/16) were invasive. The most invasive species were A. skirrowii, A. cryaerophilus, A. butzleri, and A. defluvii. All invasive strains were positive for ciaB (encoding a putative invasion protein). Other putative virulence genes were present in other species, i.e., A. butzleri (cadF, cj1349, irgA, and hecA), A. trophiarum (cj1349), A. ellisii (cj1349), and A. defluvii (irgA). No virulence genes were detected in strains which showed little or no invasion of Caco-2 cells. These results indicate that many Arcobacter species are potential pathogens of humans and animals.

Metagenomic analysis of bacterial community composition and antibiotic resistance genes in a wastewater treatment plant and its receiving surface water

“…The genus Arcobacter belongs to the phylum Proteobacteria, within which Arcobacter butzleri was proposed as one of the most frequently noticed food-borne infectious agents by International Commission on Microbiological Specifications for Foods in 1991 (Gonzalez et al, 2012). The genus Arcobacter currently contains 18 species (Levican et al, 2013;Jyothsna et al, 2013) isolated from diverse environments (water, plant roots, food, etc.) and hosts (humans, poultry, pigs, shellfish, etc.…”

Arcobacter: an emerging food-borne zoonotic pathogen, its public health concerns and advances in diagnosis and control – a comprehensive review

“…However, it is unknown whether these putative virulence genes show similar actions in Arcobacter. Even though A. butzleri has been shown to adhere and invade into various cell lines in vitro, no correlation have been shown between A. butzleri virulence genes and adhesive and invasive phenotypes (Karadas et al 2013;Levican et al 2013b). Similarly, presence of six virulence genes in the Arcobacter spp.…”

“…isolates was also reported by Karadas et al (2013) and Lehmann et al (2015). Likewise, five virulence genes (ciaB, cadF, cj1349, irgA and hecA) were detected from Arcobacter isolated from different sources namely meat, shellfish, sewage, feces from pigs, sheep and chickens, environmental sources, piggery effluent, seawater roots of Spartina alterni flora and porcine aborted fetus from Nottingham, United Kingdom (Levican et al 2013b). Draft genome of Arcobacter from various sources like pig, dairy cattle manure origin, broiler carcasses and human feces have been recently documented which can help in exploring the various genes and their roles in virulence and pathogenicity (Adam et al 2014a(Adam et al , 2014b(Adam et al , 2014c.…”

Prevalence of ten putative virulence genes in the emerging foodborne pathogen Arcobacter isolated from food products

“…Douidah et al (2012) and Karadas et al (2013) developed PCR assays for the detection of all these virulence genes in Arcobacter, proving their presence in A. butzleri, A. cryaerophilus and A. skirrowii. Since then, few studies have analysed the occurrence of putative virulence genes in Arcobacter species isolated from humans and animal food sources Ferreira et al, 2014;Lehmann et al, 2015;Levican et al, 2013;Tabatabaei et al, 2014). There is a need for further information in this regard; thus, it would be interesting to expand the range of food sources tested.…”