Novel Clonal Complexes with an Unknown Animal Reservoir Dominate Campylobacter jejuni Isolates from River Water in New Zealand

• Published in: Applied and Environmental Microbiology Vol. 75; no. 19; pp. 6038 - 6046
• Main Authors: Carter, P.E, McTavish, S.M, Brooks, H.J.L, Campbell, D, Collins-Emerson, J.M, Midwinter, A.C, French, N.P
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington, DC American Society for Microbiology 01-10-2009; American Society for Microbiology (ASM)
• Subjects: Animals; Animals, Domestic - microbiology; Animals, Wild - microbiology; Bacteria; Bacterial Typing Techniques; Bacteriology; Biological and medical sciences; Campylobacter jejuni; Campylobacter jejuni - classification; Campylobacter jejuni - genetics; Campylobacter jejuni - isolation & purification; Cluster Analysis; DNA Fingerprinting; DNA, Bacterial - genetics; Fresh Water - microbiology; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Genotype; Humans; Manures; Microbiology; Molecular Epidemiology; New Zealand; Public Health Microbiology; Reservoirs; Rivers; Wildfowl; New Zealand; Campylobacteraceae; Animal; Bacteria; Isolate; Reservoir; Complexes; River water; Campylobacter jejuni
• ISSN: 0099-2240; 1098-5336; 1098-6596
• DOI: 10.1128/AEM.01039-09

Campylobacter jejuni is widely distributed in the environment, and river water has been shown to carry high levels of the organism. In this study, 244 C. jejuni isolates from three river catchment areas in New Zealand were characterized using multilocus sequence typing. Forty-nine of the 88 sequence types identified were new. The most common sequence types identified were ST-2381 (30 isolates), ST-45 (25 isolates), and ST-1225 (23 isolates). The majority of the sequence types identified in the river water could be attributed to wild bird fecal contamination. Two novel clonal complexes (CC) were identified, namely, CC ST-2381 (11 sequence types, 46 isolates) and CC ST-3640 (6 sequence types, 12 isolates), in which all of the sequence types were new. CC ST-2381 was the largest complex identified among the isolates and was present in two of the three rivers. None of the sequence types associated with the novel complexes has been identified among human isolates. The ST-2381 complex is not related to complexes associated with cattle, sheep, or poultry. The source of the novel complexes has yet to be identified.