Antibiotics are often used to prevent sickness and improve production in animal agriculture, and the residues in animal bodies may enter tannery wastewater during leather production. This study aimed to use Illumina high-throughput sequencing to investigate the occurrence, diversity and abundance of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) and mobile genetic elements (MGEs) in aerobic and anaerobic sludge of a full-scale tannery wastewater treatment plant (WWTP). Metagenomic analysis showed that Proteobacteria, Firmicutes, Bacteroidetes and Actinobacteria dominated in the WWTP, but the relative abundance of archaea in anaerobic sludge was higher than in aerobic sludge. Sequencing reads from aerobic and anaerobic sludge revealed differences in the abundance of functional genes between both microbial communities. Genes coding for antibiotic resistance were identified in both communities. BLAST analysis against Antibiotic Resistance Genes Database (ARDB) further revealed that aerobic and anaerobic sludge contained various ARGs with high abundance, among which sulfonamide resistance gene sul1 had the highest abundance, occupying over 20% of the total ARGs reads. Tetracycline resistance genes (tet) were highly rich in the anaerobic sludge, among which tet33 had the highest abundance, but was absent in aerobic sludge. Over 70 types of insertion sequences were detected in each sludge sample, and class 1 integrase genes were prevalent in the WWTP. The results highlighted prevalence of ARGs and MGEs in tannery WWTPs, which may deserve more public health concerns.
Human health is at
great risk due to the spreading of antimicrobial
resistance (AMR). The lengthy procedure of conventional antimicrobial
susceptibility testing (AST) usually requires a few days. We developed
a fast Raman-assisted antibiotic susceptibility test (FRAST), which
detects single bacterial metabolic activity in the presence of antibiotics,
using Raman single-cell spectroscopy. It was found that single-cell
Raman spectra (SCRS) would show a clear and distinguishable Raman
band at the “silent zone” (2000–2300 cm–1), due to the active incorporation of deuterium from heavy water
(D2O) by antibiotic-resistant bacteria. This pilot study
has compared the FRAST and the conventional AST for six clinical standard
quality controls (four Gram-negative and two Gram-positive bacteria
strains) in response to 38 antibiotics. In total, 3200 treatments
have been carried out and approximately 64 000 SCRS have been
acquired for FRAST analysis. The result showed an overall agreement
of 88.0% between the FRAST and the conventional AST assay. The gram-staining
classification based on the linear discriminant analysis (LDA) model
of SCRS was developed, seamlessly coupling with the FRAST to further
reduce the turnaround time. We applied the FRAST to real clinical
analysis for nine urinary infectious samples and three sepsis samples.
The results were consistent with MALDI-TOF identification and the
conventional AST. Under the optimal conditions, the “sample
to report” of the FRAST could be reduced to 3 h for urine samples
and 21 h for sepsis samples. The FRAST provides fast and reliable
susceptibility tests, which could speed up microbiological analysis
for clinical practice and facilitate antibiotic stewardship.
The aim of this study was to investigate the prevalence and characteristics of ACME (arginine catabolic mobile element)-arcA-positive isolates among meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus haemolyticus (MRSH). ACME-arcA, native arcA and SCCmec elements were detected by PCR. Susceptibilities to 10 antimicrobial agents were compared between ACME-arcA-positive and -negative isolates by chi-square test. PFGE was used to investigate the clonal relatedness of ACME-arcA-positive isolates. The phylogenetic relationships of ACME-arcA and native arcA were analysed using the neighbour-joining methods of MEGA software. A total of 42 (47.7 %) of 88 isolates distributed in 13 PFGE types were positive for the ACME-arcA gene. There were no significant differences in antimicrobial susceptibility between ACME-arcA-positive and -negative isolates. A novel ccr allotype (ccrAB SHP ) was identified in ACME-arcA-positive isolates. Among 42 ACME-arcA-positive isolates: 8 isolates harboured SCCmec V, 8 isolates harboured class C1 mec complex and ccrAB SHP ; 22 isolates harbouring class C1 mec complex and 4 isolates harbouring class C2 mec complex were negative for all known ccr allotypes. The ACME-arcApositive isolates were first found in MRSH with high prevalence and clonal diversity, which suggests a mobility of ACME within MRSH. The results from this study revealed that MRSH is likely to be one of the potential reservoirs of ACME for Staphylococcus aureus.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.