Acinetobacter baumannii’s lifestyle includes soil-dwelling colonization of decaying plant material and airborne spread
Abstract
Abstract Acinetobacter baumannii is a Gram-negative nosocomial pathogen that is notorious for its rapid development of antibiotic resistance. However, its ecology and evolution outside hospital settings remain poorly defined. Here, we demonstrate that the natural lifestyle of A. baumannii includes soil-dwelling and airborne dissemination, which helps explaining its adaptability and tolerance to desiccation, radiation and antibiotics, and thus its predisposition to establish within hospitals. Starting from white stork nestlings previously discovered as a reservoir, we studied food chains and associated environments and identified soil and decaying plants as habitats. We demonstrate that sterilized plant material is rapidly colonized by airborne A. baumannii . A set of 401 genomes were sequenced and compared to publicly available genomes, revealing numerous links between wildlife isolates and hospital strains, and disclosing intercontinental dispersal. Our pan-genome estimate of the species (~51,000 gene families) more than doubles that of previous studies. Our data further suggest massive radiation of the species early after its emergence, possibly fostered by human activity since the Neolithic. Now, it is possible to study the ecology and evolution of A. baumannii in nature at an unprecedented temporal and spatial resolution and to elucidate the adaptive evolution of environmental bacteria towards multidrug-resistant opportunistic pathogens.
Article Details
Authors (48)
Gottfried Wilharm
Evelyn Skiebe
Andżelina Michalska
Paul G. Higgins
Kristin Weber
Christoph Schaudinn
Christof Neugebauer
Katharina Görlitz
Gideon Meimers
Yana Rizova
Ulrike Blaschke
Christine Heider
Christiane Cuny
Stephan Drewes
Elisa Heuser
Kathrin Jeske
Jens Jacob
Rainer G. Ulrich
Marcin Bocheński
Mariusz Kasprzak
Ewa Burda
Mateusz Ciepliński
Ireneusz Kaługa
Łukasz Jankowiak
José I. Aguirre
Alejandro López-García
Ursula Höfle
Zuzanna Jagiello
Marcin Tobółka
Bartosz Janic
Piotr Zieliński
Maciej Kamiński
Johannes Frisch
Joachim Siekiera
Andreas F. Wendel
Paul Brauner
Udo Jäckel
Michael Kaatz
Stefanie Müller
Antina Lübke-Becker
Lothar H. Wieler
Johanna von Wachsmann
Lakshmipriya Thrukonda
Mustafa Helal
Lennard Epping
Silver A. Wolf
Torsten Semmler
Leszek Jerzak