Prokaryotic microbial ecology as an ecosurveillance tool for eukaryotic pathogen colonisation: Meiothermus and Naegleria fowleri.
Water Res
; 254: 121426, 2024 May 01.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-38471203
ABSTRACT
Naegleria fowleri has been detected in drinking water distribution systems (DWDS) in Australia, Pakistan and the United States and is the causative agent of the highly fatal disease primary amoebic meningoencephalitis. Previous small scale field studies have shown that Meiothermus may be a potential biomarker for N. fowleri. However, correlations between predictive biomarkers in small sample sizes often breakdown when applied to larger more representative datasets. This study represents one of the largest and most rigorous temporal investigations of Naegleria fowleri colonisation in an operational DWDS in the world and measured the association of Meiothermus and N. fowleri over a significantly larger space and time in the DWDS. A total of 232 samples were collected from five sites over three-years (2016-2018), which contained 29 positive N. fowleri samples. Two specific operational taxonomic units assigned to M. chliarophilus and M. hypogaeus, were significantly associated with N. fowleri presence. Furthermore, inoculation experiments demonstrated that Meiothermus was required to support N. fowleri growth in field-collected biofilms. This validates Meiothermus as prospective biological tool to aid in the identification and surveillance of N. fowleri colonisable sites.
Key words
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Drinking Water
/
Naegleria fowleri
Language:
En
Journal:
Water Res
/
Water res
/
Water research
Year:
2024
Document type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Australia
Country of publication:
United kingdom