Genomic epidemiology of Salmonella Infantis in Europe. The success of Salmonella enterica serovar Infantis in animal production in Europe

An important genomic epidemiology study has been published in the journal Microbial Genomics with the aim of clearing various aspects of Salmonella enterica serovar Infantis in animal production in Europe and its association with a specific megaplasmide.

The research was coordinated by the General Diagnostic Operations Directorate, the CRN for Antibiotic Resistance and the NRL for Antimcrobial Resistance of the Istituto Zooprofilattico Sperimentale of Lazio and Tuscany (IZSLT), in collaboration with the EURL for Antimicrobial Resistance and the WHO Collaborating Center for Antimicrobial Resistance in Foodborne Pathogens and Genomics, DTU-Food Denmark, EFSA and various partners from eight other European countries.

The study was conducted in the context of the activities of the European Project EFSA "ENGAGE" (Establishing Next Generation Sequencing Ability for Genomic analysis in Europe, EFSA, GP/EFSA/AFSCO/2015/01/CT1).

During the Project, the IZSLT with the General Diagnostic Operations Directorate of CRN-AR and NRL-AR, had organized a Workshop (23-24 October 2017) and a Training Course (25-27 October 2017) with all the partners on aspects of genomics and molecular epidemiology based on the use of Next Generation Sequencing and Bioinformatics Analysis methods applied to pathogens transmissible along the food chains and the correlation with antibiotic resistance.

Source: IZSLT