Staphylococcus aureus strain designation by agr and cap polymorphism typing and delineation of agr diversification by sequence analysis.

The allelic variations of the regulatory operon agr (groups I-IV) and the cap polymorphism (capsular types 5 and 8) were used as a typing scheme for rapid strain designation in Staphylococcus aureus. In combining 10 agr subgroups resolved by restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) analysis with the two cap polymorphisms 12 types could be defined. To assess whether this type designation is informative for the population structure of the species S. aureus, agr and cap types were determined in clonal lineages defined by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis (PFGE) of a collection of 219 isolates. agr groups and cap types were both linked to certain clone complexes. However, little correlation was found between the two polymorphic loci. By PFGE cluster analysis 11 prevalent and 52 sporadic clones were defined. Most of the prevalent clones (9/11) could be discriminated by agr/cap typing. Thus, this technique allows a first subdivision of isolates and an inter-center comparable designation of S. aureus clones preceding a more detailed clonal analysis by PFGE or multi-locus sequence typing (MLST). To get insight into agr diversification, sequence analysis of the variable and conserved part of agr from selected S. aureus clones was performed. Strains of agr-I displayed the highest sequence divergence on the nucleotide and amino acid level, suggesting an early diversification of this group. When analyzing the relationship between the four agr interference groups we could show: (i) one intermediate between agr-I and agr-IV alleles; (ii) agr-IV sequences seem to bridge the agr-I and -III groups and (iii) two cases of horizontal transfer of the variable gene cassette from an agr-I strain to an agr-II strain. Thus, stepwise evolutionary progression and rare events of recombination were evident in the diversification of the agr locus.

Evaluation of intraspecies interference due to agr polymorphism in Staphylococcus aureus during infection and colonization.

In Staphylococcus aureus infection, intraspecies cross-inhibition mediated by the regulatory system agr may lead to the exclusion of heterologous strains at the site of infection or colonization. We analyzed consecutive and cocolonizing strains (classified as different clones by pulsed-field gel electrophoresis) from patients with cystic fibrosis (CF) and healthy individuals. Strain replacement was accompanied by a change in the agr group in 80% of the patients with CF and in 63% of the healthy individuals. Cocolonizing strains from patients with CF were shown to belong to interfering agr groups in 6 of 10 cases. In contrast, in healthy individuals, cocolonization of the nares with strains of interfering agr groups was rarely observed. agr polymorphism has no impact on the colonization dynamics of S. aureus in patients with CF but may influence nasal colonization in health individuals.