Molecular and serological diversity of Neisseria meningitidis carrier strains isolated from Italian students aged 14 to 22 years.

ABSTRACT: Neisseria meningitidis is an obligate human commensal that commonly colonizes the oropharyngeal mucosa. Carriage is age dependent and very common in young adults. The relationships between carriage and invasive disease are not completely understood. In this work, we performed a longitudinal carrier study in adolescents and young adults (173 subjects). Overall, 32 subjects (18.5%) had results that were positive for meningococcal carriage in at least one visit (average monthly carriage rate, 12.1%). Only five subjects tested positive at all four visits. All meningococcal isolates were characterized by molecular and serological techniques. Multilocus sequence typing, PorA typing, and sequencing of the 4CMenB vaccine antigens were used to assess strain diversity. The majority of positive subje

SUBMITTER: Gasparini R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4042792 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature