Prevalence and distribution of the insertion element ISMag1 in Mycoplasma agalactiae

Abstract

In characterising Mycoplasma agalactiae strains from various European countries and from Africa, a new insertion sequence (IS), ISMag1, which is related to IS of the family of IS30 insertion elements, has been identified by DNA sequence analysis and Southern blot hybridisation. ISMag1 has a size of 1515bp, and contains inverted repeats of 3bp and a gene encoding the putative transposase on a single open reading frame. ISMag1 is present only in the rarely isolated serotypes E, F, G and H of M. agalactiae, where it is found in 1 to approximately 30 copies. The different patterns obtained by hybridisation of a labelled probe of ISMag1 to genomic DNA cut with various restriction enzymes correlat..