Enterococcus phage Nonaheksakonda infecting clinical isolates of Enterococcus faecalis represents a new lineage in the family Siphoviridae.

Nikoline S Olsen, Katrine Johansen Nielsen, Maja Plöger, Witold Kot, Lars Hestbjerg Hansen

Archives of virology 2021 Feb

filter terms:

Enterococcus phage Nonaheksakonda was isolated from wastewater, using a vancomycin-resistant strain of the opportunistic pathogen Enterococcus faecalis (VRE) as a host. Nonaheksakonda is a lytic phage infecting E. faecalis V583 and clinical isolates with at least four different multi-locus sequence types (MLSTs). The genome is a 41.9-kb double-stranded DNA molecule (34.6% GC) with 74 coding sequences. Comparative analysis revealed only one close relative, Enterococcus phage heks. All other phages had low protein similarity and shared less than 54% nucleotide sequence identity with phage Nonaheksakonda. The most similar phages were all classified and unclassified efquatroviruses. We propose that the phages Nonaheksakonda and heks represent a novel genus within the family Siphoviridae, order Caudovirales, for which we propose the name "Nonaheksakondavirus".

Citation

Nikoline S Olsen, Katrine Johansen Nielsen, Maja Plöger, Witold Kot, Lars Hestbjerg Hansen. Enterococcus phage Nonaheksakonda infecting clinical isolates of Enterococcus faecalis represents a new lineage in the family Siphoviridae. Archives of virology. 2021 Feb;166(2):593-599