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Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, July 2000, p. 1906-1910, Vol. 44, No. 7
0066-4804/00/$04.00+0
Copyright © 2000, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.

Genetic Organization of the Downstream Region of the mecA Element in Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureus Isolates Carrying Different Polymorphisms of This Region

Duarte C. Oliveira,1,2 Shang W. Wu,2 and Hermínia de Lencastre1,2,*

Molecular Genetics Unit, Instituto de Tecnologia Química e Biológica da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Oeiras, Portugal,1 and Laboratory of Microbiology, The Rockefeller University, New York, New York 100212

Received 12 January 2000/Returned for modification 6 March 2000/Accepted 11 April 2000

We describe here the genetic organization of the mec element downstream of the mecA gene in 34 different methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) clinical isolates carrying 13 of the most frequent polymorphisms of mecA and representing the major epidemic clones of MRSA. All polymorphisms carried three common genetic elements: the hypervariable region, a copy of IS431, and a unique 2-kb sequence (downstream constant segment, or dcs) for which no homologous sequences are found in data banks. Polymorphisms of the downstream region were shown to be caused by the presence of linearized plasmids flanked by insertion sequences (pUB110, pT181, and pI258) and the autonomous insertion sequence IS256.


* Corresponding author. Mailing address: The Rockefeller University, 1230 York Ave., New York, NY 10021. Phone: (212) 327-8278. Fax: (212) 327-8688. E-mail: lencash{at}rockvax.rockefeller.edu.


Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, July 2000, p. 1906-1910, Vol. 44, No. 7
0066-4804/00/$04.00+0
Copyright © 2000, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.



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