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Title: Evaluating the occurrence of Escherichia albertii in chicken carcass rinses by PCR, Vitek analysis, and sequencing of the rpoB Gene

Author
item LINDSEY, REBECCA - Former ARS Employee
item FEDORKA-CRAY, PAULA - Former ARS Employee
item ABLEY, MELANIE - Former ARS Employee
item TURPIN, JENNIFER - Former ARS Employee
item Meinersmann, Richard - Rick

Submitted to: Applied and Environmental Microbiology
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 12/18/2014
Publication Date: 3/1/2015
Citation: Lindsey, R., Fedorka-Cray, P., Abley, M., Turpin, J., Meinersmann, R.J. 2015. Evaluating the occurrence of Escherichia albertii in chicken carcass rinses by PCR, Vitek analysis, and sequencing of the rpoB Gene. Applied and Environmental Microbiology. 81(5):1727-1734.

Interpretive Summary: About 20 years ago a new species of bacteria was described that appears to be associated with gastrointestinal disease in humans. The organism, known as Escherichia albertii, is very closely related to Escherichia coli and Hafnia alvei, organisms that are highly variable leading to difficulties in finding traits that distinguish the species. E. albertii was also recently found to cause a large die-off of wild birds opening the question of how often the organism occurs in birds that could lead to human exposure. So this study was designed to determine if E. albertii was present in chicken carcass rinses samples from federally inspected poultry slaughter and processing facilities. Furthermore the isolated organisms were further characterized to determine if a reliable method to distinguish the species could be found. E. albertii was found in 1.6 % (27/1644) of the chicken rinse samples. Assays for the presence of several virulence properties were performed but none of them were consistently present. However, DNA sequencing of the rpoB gene yielded a sequence that was uniformly consistent for the species. It was concluded that the occurrence of E. albertii is probably being substantially under-estimated but the rpoB gene sequence provides a central method of identification.

Technical Abstract: Escherichia albertii is a recently described species that has been associated with gastroenteritis in humans and with healthy and ill birds. Most recently it has been identified as the causative agent in a foodborne outbreak in Japan. The distribution and clinical importance of E. albertii is not well studied because its importance is unclear. Culture methods for clinical isolation frequently miss E. albertii or incorrectly identified it as Shigella spp., E. coli, or Hafnia alvei. This study was designed to determine if E. albertii could be recovered from from chicken carcass rinses collected at slaughter during a one year period from November 2009 until October 2010. Colonies were isolated from chicken carcass rinses and tested by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for the presence or absence of clpX, lysP, mdh, intimin (eae), Shiga toxins 1 and 2 (stx1, stx2, stx2f), heat-stable enterotoxin A (staA), and cytolethal distending toxin 1 and 2 (cdtB) genes. Sixty-five isolates were analyzed by sequencing a section of the rpoB gene. Fourteen fixed differences between E. albertii and other closely related organisms were detected in a section of the rpoB gene. This is the first study to detect and examine E. albertii isolates in a large population of chicken carcass rinses from across the USA. The fixed differences found in the rpoB gene could aid in future identification of E. albertii from closely related.