Multiple staphylococcal cassette chromosomes and allelic variants of cassette chromosome recombinases in Staphylococcus aureus and coagulase-negative staphylococci from Norway.

ABSTRACT: We investigated the nature of the staphylococcal cassette chromosome mec (SCCmec) elements and cognate insertion sites in a collection of 42 clinical staphylococcal isolates of various species from Norway. The ccr and mec genes and the attachment sites (attL/attR) were identified by PCR, Southern blot hybridization, and DNA sequencing. We found 10 possibly new SCCmec types and one previously unreported variant of SCCmec type III (mec complex A, ccrAB3, and ccrC7) in Staphylococcus epidermidis, Staphylococcus haemolyticus, and Staphylococcus hominis. Eleven of 42 strains contained multiple copies of ccr, suggesting the presence of mosaic structures composed of multiple SCC elements. S. haemolyticus contained ccrAB2 genes identical to those in S. aureus SCCmec type IV but lacked IS1272 and m

SUBMITTER: Hanssen AM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1855542 | biostudies-literature | 2007 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature