SERUM SURVIVAL OF ESCHERICHIA COLI - ISM 2018 Annual Meeting

We are interested in understanding the serum resistance of extraintestinal pathogenic coli (ExPEC) strains
These strains are involved in colisepticemia, which has recently become a major public health problem
Nonpathogenic coli strain K12 undergoes lysis with exposure to low serum concentrations (5%). However, drug-resistant ExPEC strains, the major cause of septicemia, are characterized by high resistance to serum
To understand the mechanism of resistance, we selected for bacteria with increased serum resistance. The selection was performed by exposing cells to 1% serum for about 100 generations
Following the selection we obtained several bacteria that are able to grow in the presence of 10% serum, while the original bacteria could not grow even in the presence of 2% serum