The acquisition of clinically relevant amoxicillin resistance in Streptococcus pneumoniae requires ordered horizontal gene transfer of four loci.

ABSTRACT: Understanding how antimicrobial resistance spreads is critical for optimal application of new treatments. In the naturally competent human pathogen Streptococcus pneumoniae, resistance to β-lactam antibiotics is mediated by recombination events in genes encoding the target proteins, resulting in reduced drug binding affinity. However, for the front-line antibiotic amoxicillin, the exact mechanism of resistance still needs to be elucidated. Through successive rounds of transformation with genomic DNA from a clinically resistant isolate, we followed amoxicillin resistance development. Using whole genome sequencing, we showed that multiple recombination events occurred at different loci during one round of transformation. We found examples of non-contiguous recombination, and demonstrated tha

SUBMITTER: Gibson PS 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9352194 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature