Prevalence, genetic analysis and CRISPR typing of Cronobacter spp. isolated from meat and meat products in China.
Haiyan Zeng, Chengsi Li, Na Ling, Jumei Zhang, Moutong Chen, Tao Lei, Shi Wu, Xiaojuan Yang, Dandan Luo, Yu Ding, Juan Wang, Shuhong Zhang, Qingping Wu
Author Information
Haiyan Zeng: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Chengsi Li: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Na Ling: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Jumei Zhang: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Moutong Chen: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Tao Lei: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Shi Wu: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Xiaojuan Yang: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Dandan Luo: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Yu Ding: Department of Food Science &Technology, Jinan University, Guangzhou, China.
Juan Wang: College of Food Science, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou, China.
Shuhong Zhang: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China.
Qingping Wu: Guangdong Institute of Microbiology, Guangdong Academy of Sciences, Guangzhou 510070, China; State Key Laboratory of Applied Microbiology Southern China, Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Microbiology Culture Collection and Application, Guangdong Open Laboratory of Applied Microbiology, Guangzhou 510070, China. Electronic address: wuqp203@163.com.
Cronobacter spp. are important foodborne pathogens that infections occur in all age groups, especially cause serious life-threatening diseases in infants. This study aimed to acquire data on Cronobacter spp. contamination of meat and meat products (n = 588) in China during 2011 to 2016, and investigated the use of CRISPR typing technology as an approach for characterizing the genetics of Cronobacter spp. The overall contamination rate for Cronobacter spp. was determined to be 9.18% (54/588). Of the positive samples, 90.74% (49/54) had <10 MPN/g, with duck samples had a relatively high contamination rate (15.69%, 8/51) and highest contamination level (28.90 MPN/g). Four species and nine serotypes were identified among 69 isolates, of which C. sakazakii was the major species (n = 50) and C. sakazakii serogroup O1 and O2 (n = 17) were the primary serotypes. The majority of Cronobacter spp. strains were found to be susceptible to most antibiotics except exhibited high resistance to cephalothin (76.81%, 53/69), and total two multi-drug resistant C. sakazakii strains were isolated from duck. The genetic diversity of Cronobacter spp. was remarkably high, as evidenced by the identification of 40 sequence types (STs) and 60 CRISPR types (CTs). C. sakazakii ST64 (n = 7) was the predominant genotype and was further divided into two sub-lineages based on CRISPR diversity, showing different antibiotic resistance profile. These results demonstrate that CRISPR typing results have a good correspondence with bacterial phenotypes, and it will be a tremendously useful approach for elucidating inter-subtyping during molecular epidemiological investigations while interpreting the divergent evolution of Cronobacter. The presence of Cronobacter spp. in meat and meat product is a potential threat to human public health.
