Xie, Ouli, Zachreson, Cameron, Tonkin-Hill, Gerry, Price, David J., Lacey, Jake A., Morris, Jacqueline M., McDonald, Malcolm I., Bowen, Asha C., Giffard, Philip M., Currie, Bart J., Carapetis, Jonathan R., Holt, Deborah C., Bentley, Stephen D., Davies, Mark R., and Tong, Steven Y.C. (2024) Overlapping Streptococcus pyogenes and Streptococcus dysgalactiae subspecies equisimilis household transmission and mobile genetic element exchange. Nature Communications, 15. 3477.

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Abstract

Streptococcus dysgalactiae subspecies equisimilis (SDSE) and Streptococcus pyogenes share skin and throat niches with extensive genomic homology and horizontal gene transfer (HGT) possibly underlying shared disease phenotypes. It is unknown if cross-species transmission interaction occurs. Here, we conduct a genomic analysis of a longitudinal household survey in remote Australian First Nations communities for patterns of cross-species transmission interaction and HGT. Collected from 4547 person-consultations, we analyse 294 SDSE and 315 S. pyogenes genomes. We find SDSE and S. pyogenes transmission intersects extensively among households and show that patterns of co-occurrence and transmission links are consistent with independent transmission without inter-species interference. We identify at least one of three near-identical cross-species mobile genetic elements (MGEs) carrying antimicrobial resistance or streptodornase virulence genes in 55 (19%) SDSE and 23 (7%) S. pyogenes isolates. These findings demonstrate co-circulation of both pathogens and HGT in communities with a high burden of streptococcal disease, supporting a need to integrate SDSE and S. pyogenes surveillance and control efforts.

Item ID:	85231
Item Type:	Article (Research - C1)
ISSN:	2041-1723
Copyright Information:	Open Access. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Funders:	National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia (NHMRC)
Projects and Grants:	NHMRC GNT2013831
Date Deposited:	23 Apr 2025 23:37
FoR Codes:	32 BIOMEDICAL AND CLINICAL SCIENCES > 3207 Medical microbiology > 320701 Medical bacteriology @ 50% 45 INDIGENOUS STUDIES > 4504 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health and wellbeing > 450402 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander biomedical and clinical sciences @ 50%
SEO Codes:	20 HEALTH > 2004 Public health (excl. specific population health) > 200404 Disease distribution and transmission (incl. surveillance and response) @ 50% 21 INDIGENOUS > 2103 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health > 210399 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health not elsewhere classified @ 50%
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