title: Banana infecting fungus, Fusarium musae, is also an opportunistic human pathogen: are bananas potential carriers and source of fusariosis?
abstract: During re-identification of Fusarium strains in the BCCM™/IHEM fungal collection by multilocus sequence-analysis we observed that five strains, previously identified as Fusarium verticillioides, were Fusarium musae, a species described in 2011 from banana fruits. Four strains were isolated from blood samples or biopsies of immune-suppressed patients and one was isolated from the clinical environment, all originating from different hospitals in Belgium or France, 2001-2008. The F. musae identity of our isolates was confirmed by phylogenetic analysis using reference sequences of type material. Absence of the gene cluster necessary for fumonisin biosynthesis, characteristic to F. musae, was also the case for our isolates. In vitro antifungal susceptibility testing revealed no important differences in their susceptibility compared to clinical F. verticillioides strains and terbinafine was the most effective drug. Additional clinical F. musae strains were searched by performing BLAST queries in GenBank. Eight strains were found, of which six were keratitis cases from the U.S. multistate contact lens-associated outbreak in 2005 and 2006. The two other strains were also from the U.S., causing either a skin infection or sinusitis. This report is the first to describe F. musae as causative agent of superficial and opportunistic, disseminated infections in humans. Imported bananas might act as carriers of F. musae spores and be a potential source of infection with F. musae in humans. An alternative hypothesis is that the natural distribution of F. musae is geographically a lot broader than originally suspected and F. musae is present on different plant hosts.
authors.affiliation: Scientific Institute of Public Health, Department of Mycology and Aerobiology, BCCM™/IHEM fungal collection, Juliette Wytsmanstraat 14, 1050 Brussels, Belgium david.triest@wiv-isp.be.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Triest
authors.affiliation: Scientific Institute of Public Health, Department of Mycology and Aerobiology, BCCM™/IHEM fungal collection, Juliette Wytsmanstraat 14, 1050 Brussels, Belgium.
authors.forename: Dirk
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Stubbe
authors.affiliation: Scientific Institute of Public Health, Department of Biomonitoring, Juliette Wytsmanstraat 14, 1050 Brussels, Belgium.
authors.forename: Koen
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: De Cremer
authors.affiliation: Universitair Ziekenhuis Brussel, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Department of Microbiology and Infection Control, Laarbeeklaan 101, 1090 Brussels, Belgium.
authors.forename: Denis
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Piérard
authors.affiliation: Scientific Institute of Public Health, Department of Mycology and Aerobiology, BCCM™/IHEM fungal collection, Juliette Wytsmanstraat 14, 1050 Brussels, Belgium.
authors.forename: Monique
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Detandt
authors.affiliation: Scientific Institute of Public Health, Department of Mycology and Aerobiology, BCCM™/IHEM fungal collection, Juliette Wytsmanstraat 14, 1050 Brussels, Belgium.
authors.forename: Marijke
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hendrickx
mesh_terms: D004197:Disease Reservoirs / Q000382:microbiology*; D060585:Fusariosis / Q000382:microbiology*; D005670:Fusarium / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification* / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D028521:Musa / Q000382:microbiology*; D010802:Phylogeny; D010935:Plant Diseases / Q000382:microbiology*; D014481:United States
keywords: Fusarium fujikuroi species complex; Fusarium verticillioides; antifungal drug susceptibility; clinical; epidemiology; immune-suppressed; phylogeny