Polymorphic DNA fingerprinting patterns in distinct Chromobacterium violaceum strains using ERIC-PCR analysis

Abstract

In the present study, distinct Chromobacterium violaceum strains were genetically characterized from polymorphicDNA fi ngerprinting patterns. Such assays were performed in presence of primer ERICII,originally designed from enterobacterial intergenic repetitive element sequences. Clustering analysis ofthe ERIC-PCR products and genetic similarity phenogram were estimated by using the coeffi cient ofSorensen-Dice and the UPGMA algorithm in the NTSYS-pc computer program. Genotypic diversityand the Shannon gene diversity indexes among the bacterial strains were calculated using the populationgenetics package POPGENE. Four main groups including individuals belonged to specifi c strainswere defi ned by clustering analysis of ERIC-PCR products, in which similarity coeffi cients varied from0.57 to 1 The inter-strain genetic distance and identity calculations revealed that the largest distancewas observed between C. violaceum ATCC12472 and 07.1 strains (0.6414) and that the greatest identitybetween those identifi ed as C. violaceum ATCC12472 and CBM strains (0.7622), confi rming the patterngenerated in the similarity phenogram. Considering the accentuated reproducibility in amplifi cation reactions and the highly polymorphic DNA fi ngerprinting profi le observed for each bacterial strain,these fi ndings create real possibilities for the detection of C. violaceum strains in microbial mixed culturesthrough ERIC-PCR assays.