Brucella anthropi is a gram negative, aerobic, motile, oxidase-positive, non-fermentative alphaproteobacteria belonging to the family Brucellaceae. It is most commonly found in the soil but is an emerging, opportunistic, and nosocomial human pathogen. The objective of this study is to understand the genome features of a drug-resistant Brucella anthropi strain SOA01 isolated from a 4-day-old neonate’s blood culture and decipher its antibiotic resistance and pathogenic potential.
Hybrid genome assembly of B. anthropi strain SOA01 was generated using quality trimmed short Illumina and long MinION reads. Identification and antibiotic susceptibility profile were determined by MALDI-TOF, in silico rMLST and Vitek-2 respectively. PATRIC webserver and VFDB was used to identify antimicrobial resistance (AMR), virulence factor (VF), and transporter genes.
B. anthropi SOA01 was found to be multi-drug resistant. Its genome is 4,975,830 bp long with a G+C content of 56.29%. Several AMR, VF and transporter genes were identified in the study genome. Antibiotic susceptibility testing revealed study strain’s resistance to different classes of antibiotics.
B. anthropi SOA01 is a multi-drug resistant strain. Several AMR and VF genes were identified in the study genome, revealing the potential threat posed by this pathogen. The genome data generated in this study is likely to be useful in better understanding of its AMR mechanisms, pathogenic potential and its successful adaptation from its primary habitat of soil to the human system. Since, it is often misidentified as B. melitensis or B. suis genome characterization and detailed understanding of its biology is crucial.

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