IncC plasmid genome rearrangements influence the vertical and horizontal transmission tradeoff in Escherichia coli.

ABSTRACT: It has been shown that an evolutionary tradeoff between vertical (host growth rate) and horizontal (plasmid conjugation) transmissions contributes to global plasmid fitness. As conjugative IncC plasmids are important for the spread of multidrug resistance (MDR), in a broad range of bacterial hosts, we investigated vertical and horizontal transmissions of two multidrug-resistant IncC plasmids according to their backbones and MDR-region rearrangements, upon plasmid entry into a new host. We observed plasmid genome deletions after conjugation in three diverse natural Escherichia coli clinical strains, varying from null to high number depending on the plasmid, all occurring in the MDR region. The plasmid burden on bacterial fitness depended more on the strain background than on the stru

SUBMITTER: Allain M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11459957 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature