MOLECULAR SUBTYPING OF STAPHYLOCOCCUS AUREUS ISOLATES FROM THE U.P. COMMUNITY FOR THE PRESENCE OF TOXIN-ENCODING GENES

<p><em>Staphylococcus aureus</em> is the most common cause of human bacterial infections; however, humans can also be asymptomatically colonized with <em>S. aureus</em>. Asymptomatic carriers can potentially spread <em>S. aureus</em> infection to others. These infections can range from mild to severe. The pathology of a <em>S. aureus</em> infection is often dependent on which toxins are expressed and the virulence factors with which they are associated. One goal of this study was to isolate <em>S. aureus</em> from healthy, consenting adult volunteers who submitted nasal swabs for culture and qRT-PCR analysis to determine which strains are present in the community. This knowledge could potentially lead to more informed treatment options when <em>S. aureus </em>infection is suspected. PCR-based subtyping was utilized to test for the presence of fifteen toxin genes: <em>lukAB, lukED, pvl, hlgA, hlgC, tst, eta, hla, hlb, hld, sea, seb, sec, sed, </em>and <em>see.</em> Isolates were also tested for the presence of the <em>mecA</em> gene, which encodes for methicillin-resistant strains of <em>S. aureus. </em></p> <p>This study was the first to attempt to identify which genes were present across all six classes of <em>Staphylococcal</em> toxins in community-colonized strains of <em>S. aureus</em>. We have laid the path toward identifying what kind of <em>S. aureus</em> isolates are present in our community. Further analysis using next-generation genome sequencing and <em>spa</em> typing will need to be utilized to compare the community strains of <em>S. aureus</em> isolated in this study to known disease-causing isolates from the hospital to discern if there is a correlation between the two.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Biology

Year dc:date.available

2017

Author dc:creator

• Kessel, Carol I

Contributors dc:contributor

• Dr. Josh Sharp

• staphylococcus
• staphylococcus aureus
• aureus
• isolates
• toxins
• genes
• Bacterial Infections and Mycoses
• Bacteriology
• Biology
• Pathogenic Microbiology

Repository record dc:identifier

https://commons.nmu.edu/theses/133

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:commons.nmu.edu:theses-1149