Publication Details

Category Text Publication
Reference Category Journals
DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0208269
Licence creative commons licence
Title (Primary) High abundances of class 1 integrase and sulfonamide resistance genes, and characterisation of class 1 integron gene cassettes in four urban wetlands in Nigeria
Author Adelowo, O.O.; Helbig, T.; Knecht, C.; Reincke, F.; Mäusezahl, I.; Müller, J.A.
Source Titel PLOS ONE
Year 2018
Department UBT
Volume 13
Issue 11
Page From e0208269
Language englisch
Abstract There is little information about environmental contamination with antibiotic resistance genes (ARG) in Sub-Saharan Africa, home to about 1 billion people. In this study we measured the abundance of three genes (sul1, sul2, and intI1) used as indicators of environmental contamination with ARGs in the sediments of four urban wetlands in southwestern Nigeria by qPCR. In addition, we characterised the variable regions of class 1 integrons in sulfamethoxazole/trimethoprim (SMX/TRI)-resistant bacteria isolated from the wetlands by PCR and DNA sequencing. The indicator ARGs were present in all wetlands with mean absolute copy numbers/gram of sediment ranging between 4.7x106 and 1.2x108 for sul1, 1.1x107 and 1x108 for sul2, and 5.3x105 and 1.9x107 for intI1. The relative abundances (ARG/16S rRNA copy number) ranged from about 10−3 to 10−1. These levels of ARG contamination were similar to those previously reported for polluted environments in other parts of the world. The integrase genes intI1 and intI2 were detected in 72% and 11.4% SMX/TRI-resistant isolates, respectively. Five different cassette array types (dfrA7; aadA2; aadA1|dfrA1; acc(6’)lb-cr|arr3|dfrA27; arr3|acc(6’)lb-cr|dfrA27) were detected among 34 (59.6%) intI1-positive isolates. No gene cassettes were found in the nine intI2-positive isolates. These results show that African urban ecosystems impacted by anthropogenic activities are reservoirs of bacteria harbouring transferable ARG.
Persistent UFZ Identifier https://www.ufz.de/index.php?en=20939&ufzPublicationIdentifier=21176
Adelowo, O.O., Helbig, T., Knecht, C., Reincke, F., Mäusezahl, I., Müller, J.A. (2018):
High abundances of class 1 integrase and sulfonamide resistance genes, and characterisation of class 1 integron gene cassettes in four urban wetlands in Nigeria
PLOS One 13 (11), e0208269 10.1371/journal.pone.0208269