Characterization of <i>Salmonella</i> Isolates from Various Geographical Regions of the Caucasus and Their Susceptibility to Bacteriophages
2020
Khatuna Makalatia | Elene Kakabadze | Jeroen Wagemans | Nino Grdzelishvili | Nata Bakuradze | Gulnara Natroshvili | Nino Macharashvili | Anahit Sedrakyan | Karine Arakelova | Zhanna Ktsoyan | Magdalina Zakharyan | Zaruhi Gevorgyan | Armine Mnatsakanyan | Farida Tishkova | Cédric Lood | Dieter Vandenheuvel | Rob Lavigne | Jean-Paul Pirnay | Daniel De Vos | Nina Chanishvili | Maia Merabishvili
Non-typhoidal <i>Salmonella</i> present a major threat to animal and human health as food-borne infectious agents. We characterized 91 bacterial isolates from Armenia and Georgia in detail, using a suite of assays including conventional microbiological methods, determining antimicrobial susceptibility profiles, matrix assisted laser desorption/ionization-time of flight (MALDI-TOF) mass spectrometry, serotyping (using the White-Kauffmann-Le Minor scheme) and genotyping (repetitive element sequence-based PCR (rep-PCR)). No less than 61.5% of the isolates were shown to be multidrug-resistant. A new antimicrobial treatment strategy is urgently needed. Phage therapy, the therapeutic use of (bacterio-) phages, the bacterial viruses, to treat bacterial infections, is increasingly put forward as an additional tool for combatting antibiotic resistant infections. Therefore, we used this representative set of well-characterized <i>Salmonella</i> isolates to analyze the therapeutic potential of eleven single phages and selected phage cocktails from the bacteriophage collection of the Eliava Institute (Georgia). All isolates were shown to be susceptible to at least one of the tested phage clones or their combinations. In addition, genome sequencing of these phages revealed them as members of existing phage genera (<i>Felixounavirus</i>, <i>Seunavirus</i>, <i>Viunavirus</i> and <i>Tequintavirus</i>) and did not show genome-based counter indications towards their applicability against non-typhoidal <i>Salmonella</i> in a phage therapy or in an agro-food setting.
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