Molecular Characterization and Comparative Genomics of IncQ-3 Plasmids Conferring Resistance to Various Antibiotics Isolated from a Wastewater Treatment Plant in Warsaw (Poland)

Abstract

As small, mobilizable replicons with a broad host range, IncQ plasmids are widely distributed among clinical and environmental bacteria. They carry antibiotic resistance genes, and it has been shown that they confer resistance to β-lactams, fluoroquinolones, aminoglycosides, trimethoprim, sulphonamides, and tetracycline. The previously proposed classification system divides the plasmid group into four subgroups, i.e., IncQ-1, IncQ-2, IncQ-3, and IncQ-4. The last two subgroups have been poorly described so far. The aim of this study was to analyze five newly identified IncQ-3 plasmids isolated from a wastewater treatment plant in Poland and to compare them with all known plasmids belonging to the IncQ-3 subgroup whose sequences were retrieved from the NCBI database. The complete nucleotide sequences of the novel plasmids were annotated and bioinformatic analyses were performed, including identification of core genes and auxiliary genetic load. Furthermore, functional experiments testing plasmid mobility were carried out. Phylogenetic analysis based on three core genes (repA, mobA/repB, and mobC) revealed the presence of three main clusters of IncQ-3 replicons. Apart from having a highly conserved core, the analyzed IncQ-3 plasmids were vectors of antibiotic resistance genes, including (I) the qnrS2 gene that encodes fluoroquinolone resistance and (II) β-lactam, trimethoprim, and aminoglycoside resistance genes within integron cassettes.

The Effects of Wastewater Treatment Plant Failure on the Gulf of Gdansk (Southern Baltic Sea)

“…“Czajka” Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP) is the main wastewater treatment facility in the capital city of Poland, Warsaw [ 1 ]. It is the largest and most modern wastewater treatment facility in Poland and in Eastern Europe, collecting raw wastewater from both sides of the capital city, which is divided by the Vistula River—the largest river in Poland.…”

Molecular Characterization of Class 1, 2 and 3 Integrons in Serratia spp. Clinical Isolates in Poland – Isolation of a New Plasmid and Identification of a Gene for a Novel Fusion Protein

“…Piotrowska et al developed molecular characterization and comparative genomics of IncQ-3 plasmids isolated from raw wastewater of “Czajka” Wastewater Treatment Plant in Warsaw, Poland. 45 Plasmid p115_p2 hosted in Raoultella sp. and isolated from raw wastewater has identical size as plasmid pPCMI3 and, moreover, BLAST analysis revealed high level homology (more than 99.9%) between them.…”

“…The first of these, dfrB3, which is responsible for resistance to trimethoprim, 43 and the second gene cassette encoding β-lactamase GES-7, had been already described in the DNA sequences of integrons. [44][45][46] The last one is a gene cassette coding the fusion protein OXA/aac(6ʹ)-Ib-cr, it consists of β-lactamase OXA responsible for resistance to βlactams and acetyltransferase aac(6ʹ)-Ib-cr responsible for resistance to aminoglycosides and fluoroquinolones. Gene aac(6ʹ)-Ib-cr has been detected in many clinical strains of bacteria.…”

Distribution characteristics of antibiotic resistance bacteria and related genes in urban recreational lakes replenished by different supplementary water source

“…In recent years, due to the shortage of water resources, reclaimed water which has excellent recyclability is gradually used to replace surface water as the supplementary water source of urban landscape water (Zhao et al 2011). However, the current sewage treatment standards and technology make it hard to effectively treat ARB and ARGs in reclaimed water (Hwangbo et al 2019;Posada-Perlaza et al 2019;Verburg et al 2019;Piotrowska et al 2020;Zammit et al 2020), this may lead to a considerable number of ARBs and ARGs in reclaimed water, which may aggravate the content of resistant bacteria and resistant genes in urban recreational water, and increase the public safety risk of urban residents. (Dong et al 2019).…”