Effect of Therapeutic Phage-based In Vitro Treatment on the Spread of Staphylococcal Mobilome
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| Year of publication | 2025 |
| Type | Conference abstract |
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| Description | Mobilome transmission represents a major force in the emergence of pathogenic staphylococci. Some antibiotics can induce prophages spreading antibiotic resistance and virulence factors. Therapeutical staphylococcal phages of the genus Kayvirus have already been shown not to mediate transduction, but their effect on the mobilome spread via prophage induction is unclear. The aim of the study was to evaluate the effect of different therapeutic approaches on mobilome spread via induced phage-mediated transduction. Staphylococcus epidermidis strain was treated with ciprofloxacin, lytic phage 812h1, and their combination. The viable cell count of the culture and the phage titers were determined. Long-read sequencing was used to evaluate mobilome distribution in released virions. Ciprofloxacin treatment did not lead to culture eradication, and the virions contained 40% of genome copies of the induced phage and 60% of other genetic elements. After treatment with phage 812h1, more than 99% of genome copies belonged to this lytic phage, and the titer of induced phage was reduced 100-fold. In combined treatment, the genome of lytic phage was present in 60 to 99.9% of the virions, depending on the MOI used. This was the most effective treatment in eradicating the bacteria in vitro. Phage 812h1-only treatment resulted in a reduced risk of mobilome transduction, and even in combined treatment, this risk was not increased compared with ciprofloxacin-only treatment. |
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