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Background: Staphylococcus aureus is associated with a spectrum of symbiotic relationships with its human host from carriage to sepsis and is frequently associated with nosocomial and community-acquired infections, thus the differential gene content among strains is of interest., Results: We sequenced three clinical strains and combined these data with 13 publically available human isolates and one bovine strain for comparative genomic analyses. All genomes were annotated using RAST, and then their gene similarities and differences were delineated. Gene clustering yielded 3,155 orthologous gene clusters, of which 2,266 were core, 755 were distributed, and 134 were unique. Individual genomes contained between 2,524 and 2,648 genes. Gene-content comparisons among all possible S. aureus strain pairs (n = 136) revealed a mean difference of 296 genes and a maximum difference of 476 genes. We developed a revised version of our finite supragenome model to estimate the size of the S. aureus supragenome (3,221 genes, with 2,245 core genes), and compared it with those of Haemophilus influenzae and Streptococcus pneumoniae. There was excellent agreement between RAST's annotations and our CDS clustering procedure providing for high fidelity metabolomic subsystem analyses to extend our comparative genomic characterization of these strains., Conclusions: Using a multi-species comparative supragenomic analysis enabled by an improved version of our finite supragenome model we provide data and an interpretation explaining the relatively larger core genome of S. aureus compared to other opportunistic nasopharyngeal pathogens. In addition, we provide independent validation for the efficiency and effectiveness of our orthologous gene clustering algorithm.

Objectives: We sought to construct and partially characterize complementary DNA (cDNA) libraries prepared from the middle ear mucosa (MEM) of chinchillas to better understand pathogenic aspects of infection and inflammation, particularly with respect to leukotriene biogenesis and response., Methods: Chinchilla MEM was harvested from controls and after middle ear inoculation with nontypeable Haemophilus influenzae. RNA was extracted to generate cDNA libraries. Randomly selected clones were subjected to sequence analysis to characterize the libraries and to provide DNA sequence for phylogenetic analyses. Reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction of the RNA pools was used to generate cDNA sequences corresponding to genes associated with leukotriene biosynthesis and metabolism., Results: Sequence analysis of 921 randomly selected clones from the uninfected MEM cDNA library produced approximately 250,000 nucleotides of almost entirely novel sequence data. Searches of the GenBank database with the Basic Local Alignment Search Tool provided for identification of 515 unique genes expressed in the MEM and not previously described in chinchillas. In almost all cases, the chinchilla cDNA sequences displayed much greater homology to human or other primate genes than with rodent species. Genes associated with leukotriene metabolism were present in both normal and infected MEM., Conclusions: Based on both phylogenetic comparisons and gene expression similarities with humans, chinchilla MEM appears to be an excellent model for the study of middle ear inflammation and infection. The higher degree of sequence similarity between chinchillas and humans compared to chinchillas and rodents was unexpected. The cDNA libraries from normal and infected chinchilla MEM will serve as useful molecular tools in the study of otitis media and should yield important information with respect to middle ear pathogenesis.

Background: The distributed genome hypothesis (DGH) posits that chronic bacterial pathogens utilize polyclonal infection and reassortment of genic characters to ensure persistence in the face of adaptive host defenses. Studies based on random sequencing of multiple strain libraries suggested that free-living bacterial species possess a supragenome that is much larger than the genome of any single bacterium., Results: We derived high depth genomic coverage of nine nontypeable Haemophilus influenzae (NTHi) clinical isolates, bringing to 13 the number of sequenced NTHi genomes. Clustering identified 2,786 genes, of which 1,461 were common to all strains, with each of the remaining 1,328 found in a subset of strains; the number of clusters ranged from 1,686 to 1,878 per strain. Genic differences of between 96 and 585 were identified per strain pair. Comparisons of each of the NTHi strains with the Rd strain revealed between 107 and 158 insertions and 100 and 213 deletions per genome. The mean insertion and deletion sizes were 1,356 and 1,020 base-pairs, respectively, with mean maximum insertions and deletions of 26,977 and 37,299 base-pairs. This relatively large number of small rearrangements among strains is in keeping with what is known about the transformation mechanisms in this naturally competent pathogen., Conclusion: A finite supragenome model was developed to explain the distribution of genes among strains. The model predicts that the NTHi supragenome contains between 4,425 and 6,052 genes with most uncertainty regarding the number of rare genes, those that have a frequency of <0.1 among strains; collectively, these results support the DGH.

We hypothesize that Haemophilus influenzae, as a species, possesses a much greater number of genes than that found in any single H. influenzae genome. This supragenome is distributed throughout naturally occurring infectious populations, and new strains arise through autocompetence and autotransformation systems. The effect is that H. influenzae populations can readily adapt to environmental stressors. The supragenome hypothesis predicts that significant differences exist between and among the genomes of individual infectious strains of nontypeable H. influenzae (NTHi). To test this prediction, we obtained 10 low-passage NTHi clinical isolates from the middle ear effusions of patients with chronic otitis media. DNA sequencing was performed with 771 clones chosen at random from a pooled genomic library. Homology searching demonstrated that approximately 10% of these clones were novel compared to the H. influenzae Rd KW20 genome, and most of them did not match any DNA sequence in GenBank. Amino acid homology searches using hypothetical translations of the open reading frames revealed homologies to a variety of proteins, including bacterial virulence factors not previously identified in the NTHi isolates. The distribution and expression of 53 of these genes among the 10 strains were determined by PCR- and reverse transcription PCR-based analyses. These unique genes were nonuniformly distributed among the 10 isolates, and transcription of these genes in planktonic cultures was detected in 50% (177 of 352) of the occurrences. All of the novel sequences were transcribed in one or more of the NTHi isolates. Seventeen percent (9 of 53) of the novel genes were identified in all 10 NTHi strains, with each of the remaining 44 being present in only a subset of the strains. These genic distribution analyses were more effective as a strain discrimination tool than either multilocus sequence typing or 23S ribosomal gene typing methods.