Digitala Vetenskapliga Arkivet

Change search
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf
Mutation in the Copper-Induced sil Operon Enables High-Level Silver Resistance and Silver Facilitated Co-Selection of Multidrug Resistance Plasmid
Uppsala University, Disciplinary Domain of Medicine and Pharmacy, Faculty of Medicine, Department of Medical Biochemistry and Microbiology.
Uppsala University, Disciplinary Domain of Medicine and Pharmacy, Faculty of Medicine, Department of Medical Biochemistry and Microbiology.
Uppsala University, Disciplinary Domain of Medicine and Pharmacy, Faculty of Medicine, Department of Medical Biochemistry and Microbiology.ORCID iD: 0000-0001-6640-2174
(English)Manuscript (preprint) (Other academic)
Abstract [en]

Human activities are responsible for an accumulation of metals in health care and agricultural environments, and plasmid-encoded metal tolerance operons enable bacteria to rapidly adapt to metal exposure under such conditions. While the mechanisms of action of many metal resistance systems have been described, there is still limited understanding of their role in co-selection of antibiotic resistance in metal-containing environments. Whether plasmid-encoded metal resistance genes confer significant selective advantages is of interest as it has implications for plasmid enrichment and the spread of plasmid-borne antibiotic resistance genes. To increase our understanding of plasmid-mediated metal resistance, we studied the sil operon and its phenotypes in E. coli during growth in the absence and presence of silver and copper. We found that the sil operon provides resistance to both silver and copper. However, it is induced by copper only, and constitutive expression due to point mutations in the two-component silS gene provides high-level silver resistance. Furthermore, we showed that a high-level silver resistant mutant could be enriched in the presence of silver. This enrichment entailed co-selection of the multidrug resistance plasmid pUUH239.2. Our results show that a copper resistance operon can provide high-level silver resistance following a single point mutation, and that the silver resistance phenotype subsequently can co-select for antibiotic resistance in the presence of silver. 

National Category
Other Medical Sciences not elsewhere specified
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-356961OAI: oai:DiVA.org:uu-356961DiVA, id: diva2:1237624
Available from: 2018-08-09 Created: 2018-08-09 Last updated: 2018-08-10
In thesis
1. Antibiotic Resistance: Selection in the Presence of Metals and Antimicrobials
Open this publication in new window or tab >>Antibiotic Resistance: Selection in the Presence of Metals and Antimicrobials
2018 (English)Doctoral thesis, comprehensive summary (Other academic)
Abstract [en]

The external environment is complex: Antibiotics, metals and antimicrobials do not exist in isolation but in mixtures. Human activities such as animal husbandry, fertilization of agricultural fields and human medicine release high amounts these compounds into the environment. The work in this thesis contributes to our understanding of how the selection of bacterial antibiotic resistance can be facilitated by the pollution by metals and antimicrobials. We show that low levels of antibiotics, metals and combinations thereof can lead to the selection of chromosomally encoded antibiotic resistance genes as well as a multidrug resistance plasmid. The underlying genetic and cellular mechanisms of selection identified relate to mutational changes in a plasmid-encoded metal resistance operon, and metal-associated increases in cellular membrane permeability. We further show that exposure to quaternary ammonium compounds can result in cross-resistance to antibiotics following genetic changes in genes related to efflux, membrane synthesis and transcription/translation. Taken together, the work in this thesis suggests that the stewardship of antibiotics should include prudent use of metals and antimicrobials. 

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Uppsala: Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, 2018. p. 53
Series
Digital Comprehensive Summaries of Uppsala Dissertations from the Faculty of Medicine, ISSN 1651-6206 ; 1488
Keywords
Antibiotic resistance, Metals, Antimicrobials, Bacterial evolution, Bacterial genetics
National Category
Microbiology Genetics Evolutionary Biology
Research subject
Biology with specialization in Microbiology
Identifiers
urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-356970 (URN)978-91-513-0412-0 (ISBN)
Public defence
2018-10-05, B42, BMC, Husargatan 3, Uppsala, 09:15 (English)
Opponent
Supervisors
Available from: 2018-09-14 Created: 2018-08-10 Last updated: 2018-10-02

Open Access in DiVA

No full text in DiVA

Search in DiVA

By author/editor
Albrecht, Lisa MSandegren, LinusAndersson, Dan
By organisation
Department of Medical Biochemistry and Microbiology
Other Medical Sciences not elsewhere specified

Search outside of DiVA

GoogleGoogle Scholar

urn-nbn

Altmetric score

urn-nbn
Total: 744 hits
CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf