Strain-Level Discrimination of Shiga Toxin-Producing Escherichia coli in Spinach Using Metagenomic Sequencing.

ABSTRACT: Consumption of fresh bagged spinach contaminated with Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC) has led to severe illness and death; however current culture-based methods to detect foodborne STEC are time consuming. Since not all STEC strains are considered pathogenic to humans, it is crucial to incorporate virulence characterization of STEC in the detection method. In this study, we assess the comprehensiveness of utilizing a shotgun metagenomics approach for detection and strain-level identification by spiking spinach with a variety of genomically disparate STEC strains at a low contamination level of 0.1 CFU/g. Molecular serotyping, virulence gene characterization, microbial community analysis, and E. coli core gene single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) analysis were performed on met

SUBMITTER: Leonard SR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5145215 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature