title: Determining the genetic structure of the natural population of Staphylococcus aureus: a comparison of multilocus sequence typing with pulsed-field gel electrophoresis, randomly amplified polymorphic DNA analysis, and phage typing.
abstract: We used a sample of Staphylococcus aureus strains that are carried by humans and that are representative of the natural population of S. aureus strains in order to assess the value of multilocus sequence typing (MLST), pulsed-field gel electrophoresis, randomly amplified polymorphic DNA analysis, and phage typing as epidemiological tools. Only MLST was able to define clonal complexes unambiguously. All DNA-based typing approaches achieved a high degree of agreement, implying phylogenetic concordance, but predicted epidemiological associations with variable accuracy.
authors.affiliation: Division of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, University Hospital Nottingham, Nottingham NG7 2UH, United Kingdom. Hajo.Grundmann@Nottingham.ac.uk
authors.forename: Hajo
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Grundmann
authors.forename: Satoshi
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hori
authors.forename: Mark C
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Enright
authors.forename: Carol
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Webster
authors.forename: Adriana
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Tami
authors.forename: Edward J
authors.initials: EJ
authors.lastname: Feil
authors.forename: Tyrone
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Pitt
mesh_terms: D015373:Bacterial Typing Techniques; D001434:Bacteriophage Typing; D004269:DNA, Bacterial / Q000032:analysis*; D017753:Ecosystem; D016521:Electrophoresis, Gel, Pulsed-Field; D006801:Humans; D009666:Nose / Q000382:microbiology*; D019105:Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA Technique; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D013204:Staphylococcus Phages / Q000145:classification; D013211:Staphylococcus aureus / Q000145:classification* / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D004269:DNA, Bacterial