Journal article
Gene exchange drives the ecological success of a multi-host bacterial pathogen
EJ Richardson, R Bacigalupe, EM Harrison, LA Weinert, S Lycett, M Vrieling, K Robb, PA Hoskisson, MTG Holden, EJ Feil, GK Paterson, SYC Tong, A Shittu, W van Wamel, DM Aanensen, J Parkhill, SJ Peacock, J Corander, M Holmes, JR Fitzgerald
Nature Ecology and Evolution | NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP | Published : 2018
Abstract
The capacity for some pathogens to jump into different host-species populations is a major threat to public health and food security. Staphylococcus aureus is a multi-host bacterial pathogen responsible for important human and livestock diseases. Here, using a population-genomic approach, we identify humans as a major hub for ancient and recent S. aureus host-switching events linked to the emergence of endemic livestock strains, and cows as the main animal reservoir for the emergence of human epidemic clones. Such host-species transitions are associated with horizontal acquisition of genetic elements from host-specific gene pools conferring traits required for survival in the new host-niche...
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Awarded by Department of Health and Social Care
Funding Acknowledgements
This study was supported by a project grant (BB/I013873/1) and institute strategic grant funding ISP2: BBS/E/D/20002173 from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (UK) to J.R.F., Medical Research Council (UK) grant MRNO2995X/1 to J.R.F. and Wellcome Trust collaborative award 201531/Z/16/Z to J.R.F. S.Y.C.T. is an Australian National Health and Medical Research Council Career Development Fellow (number 1065736). L.A.W. is supported by a Dorothy Hodgkin Fellowship funded by the Royal Society (grant number DH140195) and a Sir Henry Dale Fellowship jointly funded by the Wellcome Trust and Royal Society (grant number 109385/Z/15/Z). S.L. is supported by a Chancellor's Fellowship from the University of Edinburgh. M.T.G.H. was supported by the Scottish Infection Research Network and Chief Scientist Office through Scottish Healthcare Associated Infection Prevention Institute consortium funding (CSO reference: SIRN10). E.M.H. and S.J.P. were funded by The Health Innovation Challenge Fund (WT098600, HICF-T5-342), a parallel funding partnership between the Department of Health and Wellcome Trust, the UKCRC Translational Infection Research Initiative, and the Medical Research Council (grant number G1000803). S.J.P. is a National Institute for Health Research senior investigator. P.A.H. is supported by Natural Environment Research Council grant NE/M001415/1. We thank B. Blane, N. Brown and E. Torok for their role in the original study isolating and sequencing S. aureus from patients at the Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, from which 76 genomes were downloaded from the ENA and used in this study. We also thank Edinburgh Genomics for sequencing, and all those who made isolates available for the study, including the Zoological Society London, G. Foster, H. Hasman, S. Monecke, E. Smith, D. Smyth and H. Jorgensen.