Staphylococcus aureus Raw sequence reads
Background: Diabetic foot ulcer (DFU) infections are predominantly caused by Staphylococcus aureus and are the leading cause of lower limb amputations. Anolyte is a non-toxic, environmentally friendly electrochemically generated hypochlorous acid solution with powerful antimicrobial properties that has shown great promise in wound disinfection. This study evaluates immersion in anolyte as an alternative to antibiotic-based DFU treatment.Methods: Fifty-one ulcer samples were collected from patients with DFUs undergoing routine debridement. Clinical DFU features and any prior interventions were recorded. Tissues were divided into two aliquots according to wet weight and comparatively treated by immersion in equal volumes of either 200 parts per million (ppm) anolyte or sterile saline. Microbial loads of treated tissues were quantified and compared following aerobic, anaerobic, and staphylococcal-selective incubation conditions. Bacteria were identified based on 16S rRNA sequences and representative S. aureus isolates were subjected to whole genome sequencing (WGS).Staphylococcus aureus was the predominant species identified. Fifty S. aureus strains from 30 distinct tissues underwent WGS. Isolates were predominantly identified as sequence types 1, 5, 15 and 30. The methicillin resistance-encoding (mecA) and Panton-Valentine Leukocidin (pvl) genes were not detected.