title: Genetic diversity of Burkholderia pseudomallei isolates in Australia.
abstract: Melioidosis is caused by the gram-negative saprophytic bacterium Burkholderia pseudomallei, which is endemic to southeast Asia and northern Australia. We have previously found evidence of geographic localization of strains based on multilocus sequence typing (MLST). In this study, we examined the diversity of 277 isolates from northern Australia, which were resolved into 159 different sequence types. No sequence types were common to both Queensland and the Northern Territory, and there was significant differentiation between the alleles present in the two regions. The considerable diversity in sequence types contrasts with the limited diversity of alleles at MLST loci, supporting previous work suggesting a high rate of recombination relative to mutation in B. pseudomallei, where new sequence types are primarily generated by reassortment of existing alleles.
authors.affiliation: Menzies School of Health Research, Charles Darwin University, Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia.
authors.forename: Allen C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Cheng
authors.forename: Linda
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Ward
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Godoy
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Norton
authors.forename: Mark
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Mayo
authors.forename: Daniel
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Gal
authors.forename: Brian G
authors.initials: BG
authors.lastname: Spratt
authors.forename: Bart J
authors.initials: BJ
authors.lastname: Currie
mesh_terms: D000483:Alleles; D000818:Animals; D001315:Australia / Q000453:epidemiology; D016957:Burkholderia pseudomallei / Q000145:classification* / Q000235:genetics* / Q000302:isolation & purification; D016000:Cluster Analysis; D004269:DNA, Bacterial / Q000235:genetics; D019353:Endemic Diseases; D014644:Genetic Variation; D005838:Genotype; D005843:Geography; D006801:Humans; D008554:Melioidosis / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000382:microbiology*; D011995:Recombination, Genetic; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA
chemical_list: D004269:DNA, Bacterial