Supercarriers of antibiotic resistome in a world’s large river

Jiawen Wang, Rui Pan, Peiyan Dong, Shufeng Liu, Qian Chen, Alistair Borthwick, Nan Xu, Jinren Ni

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract / Description of output

Background

Antibiotic resistome has been found to strongly interact with the core microbiota in the human gut, yet little is known about how antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) correlate with certain microbes in large rivers that are regarded as “terrestrial gut.”
Results

By creating the integral pattern for ARGs and antibiotic-resistant microbes in water and sediment along a 4300-km continuum of the Yangtze River, we found that human pathogen bacteria (HPB) share 13.4% and 5.9% of the ARG hosts in water and sediment but contribute 64% and 46% to the total number of planktonic and sedimentary ARGs, respectively. Moreover, the planktonic HPB harbored 79 ARG combinations that are dominated by “natural” supercarriers (e.g., Rheinheimera texasensis and Noviherbaspirillum sp. Root189) in river basins.

Conclusions

We confirmed that terrestrial HPB are the major ARG hosts in the river, rather than conventional supercarriers (e.g., Enterococcus spp. and other fecal indicator bacteria) that prevail in the human gut. The discovery of HPB as natural supercarriers in a world’s large river not only interprets the inconsistency between the spatial dissimilarities in ARGs and their hosts, but also highlights the top priority of controlling terrestrial HPB in the future ARG-related risk management of riverine ecosystems globally.
Original languageEnglish
Article number111
JournalMicrobiome
Volume10
Issue number1
Early online date28 Jul 2022
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Dec 2022

Keywords / Materials (for Non-textual outputs)

  • antibiotic resistance genes
  • host
  • Human pathogen bacteria
  • Yangtze river
  • Host
  • Antibiotic resistance genes
  • Yangtze River
  • Water
  • Bacteria/genetics
  • Humans
  • Anti-Bacterial Agents/pharmacology
  • Genes, Bacterial/genetics
  • Microbiota
  • Plankton
  • Rivers/microbiology

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