Detection of virulence factors and antifungal susceptibility of human and avian Aspergillus flavus isolates

Publication date: Available online 12 September 2019Source: Journal de Mycologie MédicaleAuthor(s): Dhoha Ghorbel, Inès Hadrich, Sourour Neji, Houaida Trabelsi, Hatem Belaaj, Hayet Sellami, Fatma Cheikhrouhou, Fattouma Makni, Ali AyadiAbstractAspergillus flavus is the second leading cause of invasive and non-invasive aspergillosis. Secretion of hydrolytic enzymes is considered as a virulence factor in this species. Our work aimed to study in vitro production of some virulence factors, to evaluate the biofilm production against human and avian A. flavus isolates and to investigate the antifungal susceptibility agents. Hydrolytic enzymes, biofilm production and molecular typing were studied for 62 human and 36 avian A. flavus isolates by specific solid media and six microsatellite markers. The susceptibility to antifungal agents was evaluated for 37 human isolates. All human and avian A. flavus isolates showed positive activities of extracellular hydrolase: phospholipase, protease and hemolysin. A positive elastase activity was seen in 64.51% of human A. flavus isolates and 86.1% of avian A. flavus isolates. All A. flavus in these two populations formed biofilms. Statistical significant difference was observed for the mean phospholipase activities (P = 0.025) and biofilm quantification (P= 0.0001) between human and avian A. flavus isolates. The in vitro susceptibility results showed a resistance in 83.7%, 81.08% and 16.21% of A. flavus isolates respectively to amphotericin B,...
Source: Journal of Medical Mycology - Category: Biology Source Type: research