Genomic diversity of Salmonella enterica isolated from raw chicken at retail establishments in Mexico.

The genomic diversity of circulating non-typhoidal Salmonella in raw chicken was investigated in three states of central Mexico. A total of 192 S. enterica strains from chicken meat samples collected at supermarkets, fresh markets, and butcher shops were analyzed by whole-genome sequencing. The serovar distribution, occurrence of genes encoding for antimicrobial resistance, metal resistance, biocide resistance, plasmids and virulence factors, and clonal relatedness based on single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) analysis were investigated. Serovars Infantis, Schwarzengrund and Enteritidis predominated among twenty identified. The distribution of serovars and proportion of AMR genes was different according to the state, year, season, and retail establishment (p < 0.001). Genes encoding metals resistance were identified in all the strains. A total of 145 virulence genes were identified and strains were classified into 32 virulotypes; serovars Infantis, Typhimurium, and Enteritidis showed the highest number of virulence genes. The strains matched 34 SNP clusters in the NCBI Pathogen Detection server and 59 %, which corresponded to Infantis, Schwarzengrund, Saintpaul, and Enteritidis, were associated with five major clusters and matched with chicken, environmental and clinical isolates from at least three countries. These results provide useful information to understand the epidemiology of Salmonella, conduct microbial risk assessment, and design risk-based control measures.

Genomic analysis of the MLST population structure and antimicrobial resistance genes associated with Salmonella enterica in Mexico.

Salmonella enterica is one of the most commonly reported foodborne pathogens by public health agencies worldwide. In this study, the multilocus sequence typing (MLST) population structure and frequency of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) genes were evaluated in S. enterica strains from Mexico (n = 2561). The most common sources of isolation were food (44.28%), environment (27.41%), animal-related (24.83%), and human (3.48%). The most prevalent serovars were Newport (8.51%), Oranienburg (7.03%), Anatum (5.78%), Typhimurium (5.12%), and Infantis (4.57%). As determined by the 7-gene MLST scheme, the most frequent sequence types were ST23, ST64, and ST32. The core genome MLST scheme identified 132 HC2000 and 195 HC900 hierarchical clusters, with the HC2000_2 cluster being the most prevalent in Mexico (n = 256). A total of 78 different AMR genes belonging to 13 antimicrobial classes were detected in 638 genomic assemblies of S. enterica. The most frequent class was aminoglycosides (31.76%), followed by tetracyclines (12.53%) and sulfonamides (11.91%). These results can help public health agencies in Mexico prioritize their efforts and resources to increase the genomic sequencing of circulating Salmonella strains. Additionally, they provide valuable information for local and global public health efforts to reduce the impact of foodborne diseases and AMR.

Comparative virulence of the worldwide ST19 and emergent ST213 genotypes of Salmonella enterica serotype Typhimurium strains isolated from food.

Salmonella enterica Typhimurium represents one of the most frequent causal agents of food contamination associated to gastroenteritis. The sequence type ST19 is the founder and worldwide prevalent genotype within this serotype, but its replacement by emerging genotypes has been recently reported. Particularly, the ST213 genotype has replaced it as the most prevalent in clinical and contaminated food samples in Mexico and has been recently reported in several countries. In this study, the in vitro and in vivo virulence of ST213 and ST19 strains isolated from food samples in Mexico was evaluated. Three out of the five analyzed ST213 strains, showed a greater internalization capacity and increased secretion of interleukins IL-8 and IL-6 of Caco-2 cells than the ST19 strains. Microbiological counts in feces and tissues showed the ability of all strains tested to establish infection in the rat model. The ST213 strains also caused histopathological damage, characteristic of gastroenteritis in Wistar rats. In contrast to the in vitro result, one of the ST19 strains showed marked damage in the test animals. The ST213 genotype strains showed in vitro and in vivo virulence variability, but significantly higher than the observed in the ST19 genotype strains, thus such emergent genotype represents a public health concern.

Comparative stress response to food preservation conditions of ST19 and ST213 genotypes of Salmonella enterica serotype Typhimurium.

The replacement of the most prevalent Salmonella enterica genotypes has been documented worldwide. Here we tested the hypothesis that the current prevalent sequence type ST213 of serotype Typhimurium in Mexico has a higher resistance to stressful food preservation conditions than the displaced sequence ST19. ST19 showed higher cell viability percentages than ST213 in osmotic (685 mM NaCl) and acidic (pH 3.5) stress conditions and in combination with refrigeration (4 °C) and ambient (≈22 °C) temperatures. Both genotypes showed the same poststress recovery growth. ST213 formed biofilm and filamentous cells (FCs) under stress, whereas ST19 did not. ST213 cells also showed higher motility. The capacity of ST213 to form FCs may explain its lower viability percentages when compared with ST19, i.e., ST213 cells divided less under stress conditions, but FCs had the same recovery capacity of ST19 cells. ST213 presented a higher unsaturated/saturated fatty acids ratio (0.5-0.6) than ST19 (0.2-0.5), which indicates higher membrane fluidity. The transcript levels of the rpoS gene were similar between genotypes under the experimental conditions employed. Biofilm formation, the generation of FCs, cell motility and membrane modification seem to make ST213 more resistant than ST19 to food preservation environments.