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

AbstractEnterococcus phage Nonaheksakonda was isolated from wastewater, using a vancomycin-resistant strain of the opportunistic pathogenEnterococcus faecalis (VRE) as a host. Nonaheksakonda is a lytic phage infectingE. 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 familySiphoviridae, orderCaudovirales, for which we propose the name “Nonaheksakondavirus ”.

Source: Archives of Virology - January 3, 2021 Category: Virology Source Type: research