Host- plasmid network structure in wastewater is linked to antimicrobial resistance genes

Risely, Alice; Newbury, Arthur; Stalder, Thibault; Simmons, Benno I.; Top, Eva M.; Buckling, Angus; Sanders, Dirk

Abstract

As mobile genetic elements, plasmids are central for our understanding of antimicrobial resistance spread in microbial communities. Plasmids can have varying fitness effects on their host bacteria, which will markedly impact their role as antimicrobial resistance vectors. Using a plasmid population model, we first show that beneficial plasmids interact with a higher number of hosts than costly plasmids when embedded in a community with multiple hosts and plasmids. We then analyse the network of a natural host-plasmid wastewater community from a Hi-C metagenomics dataset. As predicted by the model, we find that antimicrobial resistance encoding plasmids, which are likely to have positive fitness effects on their hosts in wastewater, interact with more bacterial taxa than non-antimicrobial resistance plasmids and are disproportionally important for connecting the entire network compared to non- antimicrobial resistance plasmids. This highlights the role of antimicrobials in restructuring host-plasmid networks by increasing the benefits of antimicrobial resistance carrying plasmids, which can have consequences for the spread of antimicrobial resistance genes through microbial networks. Furthermore, that antimicrobial resistance encoding plasmids are associated with a broader range of hosts implies that they will be more robust to turnover of bacterial strains.

Citation

Risely, A., Newbury, A., Stalder, T., Simmons, B. I., Top, E. M., Buckling, A., & Sanders, D. (in press). Host- plasmid network structure in wastewater is linked to antimicrobial resistance genes. Nature Communications, 15(1), 555. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-44827-w

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jan 5, 2024
• Online Publication Date: Jan 16, 2024
• Deposit Date: Jan 22, 2024
• Publicly Available Date: Jan 24, 2024
• Journal: Nature Communications
• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 15
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 555
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-44827-w