Genotyping results of Salmonella Infantis as a food poisoning agent in Turkey between 2013 and 2017

Abstract

The aim of this study is to define the genotyping relationship between 31 Salmonella enterica subspecies enterica serovar Infantis (S. Infantis) strains, which were the most isolated and identified causes of food poisoning between 2013 and 2017 in Turkey. These isolated strains were studied with the DiversiLab System (repetitive sequence-based PCR; rep-PCR; bioMerieux, France) and traditional serotyping for the identification of S. Infantis was also carried out. Totally, 31 S. Infantis isolates were genotyped. DNA was extracted from each isolate using the Microbial DNA Isolation Kit as well as rep-PCR. The dendrogram shows the diversity of the observed samples contained in the library with 4 main clusters of S. Infantis (26 strains) being significantly different from each other with a similarity of more than 95% between strains. Furthermore, it was found that the cause of almost all of these cases originated from chicken or chicken-based products. Even though the isolated S. Infantis strains came from different geographical locations, after genotyping, their genetic profiles were found to be similar. This is the first retrospective study concerning the molecular characterization of S. Infantis isolates obtained from food poisoning cases between 2013 and 2017 in Turkey.