title: Molecular analysis of Staphylococcus aureus isolates associated with staphylococcal food poisoning in South Korea.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To investigate the molecular epidemiological study of Staphylococcus aureus from staphylococcal food poisoning (SFP) incidents in South Korea.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Three hundred and thirty-two strains isolated from ten provinces between June 1999 and January 2002 were characterized by staphylococcal enterotoxin genes, toxic shock syndrome toxin 1 (tst) gene, and exfoliative toxin genes. Toxin genotypes were sea-seh (n=197), sea (n=51), sea-seg-sei (n=14), seg-sei (n=10), seb (n=10), seb-sed-seg-sei-sej (n=3), sea-seg-seh-sei (n=1), sea-seb (n=1), sea-sec (n=1), seg-sei plus eta (n=4), and sea-seg-sei plus tst (n=40). Most of the strains could be classified into three clusters of pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) types A and B with coagulase type VII and type E with coagulase type IV. Of the ten sequence types (ST), ST1, ST59, and ST30 were frequently showed by multilocus sequence typing.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The strain belonging to PFGE pattern A with sea-seh gene, coagulase VII, and ST1 was the most epidemic clone of SFP incidents in Korea.
authors.affiliation: Department of Microbiology, National Institute of Health, Korea Center for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC), Seoul, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: J O
authors.initials: JO
authors.lastname: Cha
authors.forename: J K
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: Y H
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: Jung
authors.forename: J I
authors.initials: JI
authors.lastname: Yoo
authors.forename: Y K
authors.initials: YK
authors.lastname: Park
authors.forename: B S
authors.initials: BS
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.forename: Y S
authors.initials: YS
authors.lastname: Lee
mesh_terms: D003030:Coagulase / Q000032:analysis; D016172:DNA Fingerprinting; D016521:Electrophoresis, Gel, Pulsed-Field; D004768:Enterotoxins / Q000032:analysis; D005516:Food Microbiology; D016680:Genome, Bacterial; D006801:Humans; D007106:Immune Sera / Q000032:analysis; D007723:Korea / Q000453:epidemiology; D015183:Restriction Mapping; D013202:Staphylococcal Food Poisoning / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000382:microbiology*; D013211:Staphylococcus aureus / Q000201:enzymology / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D003030:Coagulase; D004768:Enterotoxins; D007106:Immune Sera; C019368:enterotoxin D, Staphylococcal; C026066:enterotoxin A, Staphylococcal; C031818:enterotoxin B, staphylococcal; C034959:enterotoxin C, staphylococcal