Abstract
Staphylococcus aureus is one of the most important causal agents of bovine mastitis. Population studies on bovine Staphylococcus aureus isolates have identified considerable genetic heterogeneity among strains causing mastitis. The aim of this study was to investigate the contribution of different clonal complexes and the occurrence of virulence factors and resistance determinants within bovine Staphylococcus aureus isolates.A total of 189 Staphylococcus aureus isolates obtained from milk samples of 34 dairy herds in the German Federal State of Thuringia were characterised by microarray technology.The isolates were assigned to eleven different clonal complexes with CC151, CC479 and CC133 being dominant (together 80.5%). The methicillin resistance gene mecA was found in four isolates (2.1%), which belonged to CC398. Enterotoxin genes could be detected in 79.3% of analysed Staphylococcus aureus and 19 isolates (10.1%) harboured a distinct allele of the toxic shock syndrome toxin gene, tst-RF122. The most striking finding of the present study was that almost all except one isolate (151/152) belonging to CC151, CC479 and CC133 harboured the leukocidin genes lukF-P83 and lukM, whereas no further isolates from other lineages possessed these genes.The consistent occurrence of lukF-P83/lukM in the dominating clonal complexes suggests an essential role of this leukocidin in the etiology of bovine mastitis.
Highlights
Staphylococcus (S.) aureus is one of the most common etiological agents of bovine mastitis [1]
189 isolates were examined for S. aureus specific markers like catalase, coagulase, protein A and staphylococcal accessory regulator A
(50%) and all six tested isolates belonged to CC97, which is a clonal complexes (CC) known to occur in ungulates
Summary
Staphylococcus (S.) aureus is one of the most common etiological agents of bovine mastitis [1]. Federal State of Brandenburg, S. aureus could be detected in 21.8% of all bacteriologically positive milk samples [2]. Similar observations were made in Belgium [3]. Some sequence types (ST) are mainly associated with cattle, whereas other strains are observed in a variety of hosts including humans [4]. Studies of the molecular epidemiology of S. aureus suggest that diverse strains differ in their success to cause intramammary infections in cows [1,5]. The carriage of different virulence factors like enterotoxins and leukocidin
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