Application of the antibiotic batumin for accurate and rapid identification of staphylococcal small colony variants

Abstract

BackgroundStaphylococcus aureus is a major human pathogen causing significant morbidity and mortality. The S. aureus colonies in osteomyelitis, in patients with cystic fibrosis and patients with endoprosthesis rejection frequently have an atypical morphology, i.e. staphylococcal small-colony variants, which form a naturally occurring subpopulation of clinically important staphylococci. Identification of these small colony variants is difficult, because of the loss of typical phenotypic characteristics of these variants.We wanted to improve and simplify the diagnosis of staphylococcal infection using a diagnostic preparation, consisting of 5 μg batumin paper disks. Batumin possesses a unique selective activity against all studied Staphylococcus spp., whereas all other species tested thus far are batumin resistant. We assessed the efficacy of the batumin diagnostic preparation to identify staphylococcal small colony variants, isolated from osteomyelitis patients.FindingsWith the batumin diagnostic preparation, all 30 tested staphylococcal small-colony variants had a growth inhibition zone around the disk of minimum 25 mm, accordant with the inhibition zones of the parent strains, isolated from the same patients.ConclusionsThe batumin diagnostic preparation correctly identified the small-colony variants of S. aureus, S. haemolyticus and S. epidermidis as belonging to the genus Staphylococcus, which differ profoundly from parental strains and are difficult to identify with standard methods. Identification of staphylococcal small-colony variants with the batumin diagnostic preparation is technically simple and can facilitate practical laboratory work.

The Kalimantacin Polyketide Antibiotics Inhibit Fatty Acid Biosynthesis in Staphylococcus aureus by Targeting the Enoyl‐Acyl Carrier Protein Binding Site of FabI

“…It has previously been shown that S. aureus can acquire resistance to kalimantacin A in vitro . To investigate the underlying mechanism(s) of resistance development, serial passage experiments were performed by growing S. aureus NCTC 8325 on LB agar plates containing increasing concentrations of the antibiotic.…”

Elucidation of the relative and absolute stereochemistry of the kalimantacin/batumin antibiotics

“… 6 , 7 Batumin has been patented in the Ukraine and formulated as Diastaf and used to detect staphylococci by taking advantage of its selectivity for these strains. 8 Decreased biofilm formation has also been reported for the majority of S. aureus strains investigated 9 and it has been found to reduce nasal S. aureus carriage. 10 Peschel and co-workers have recently highlighted the potential scope of narrow spectrum antibiotics in the control of bacterial populations.…”

Catalase-Negative Staphylococcus lugdunensis Strain with a Novel Point Mutation in the Catalase Gene Isolated from a Patient with Chronic Suppurative Otitis Media

“…Because of these structural gene rearrangements, our S. lugdunensis isolate is unlikely to show catalase activity when tested using biochemical assays. However, it may still be possible for certain small-colony variants (i.e., S. aureus, Staphylococcus haemolyticus, and S. epidermidis) to phenotypically show reduced catalase activity (22).…”