Multilocus Sequence Typing for Characterization of Legionella pneumophila Serogroup 1 Isolates

Abstract

Molecular typing of pathogenic relevant strains of Legionella pneumophila serogroup 1 is indispensable in determining the epidemiology of the disease. In addition to classical serotyping and subtyping using monoclonal antibodies, a variety of molecular methods have been successfully employed for epidemiological purposes including amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) analysis, pulsed-field gel electrophoresis, random amplified polymorphic DNA, and many other PCR-based methods. These techniques are currently used because of their feasibility, rapidity, and great potential for discrimination. Multilocus sequence typing (MLST) is a sequence-based variation of multilocus enzyme electrophoresis (MLEE), where several genes are compared simultaneously at their sequence level. In the future, the authors plan to validate MLST method for the whole panel of strains, and also to test other target genes, to evaluate the usefulness of MLST for L. pneumophila serogroup 1. MLST appears to be a promising typing technology, and by the selection of novel target genes this method has the potential of becoming the gold standard for L. pneumophila population studies.