Abstract
To understand antibiotic resistance in pathogenic bacteria, we need to
monitor environmental microbes as reservoirs of antimicrobial resistance
genes (ARGs). These bacteria are present in the air and can be
investigated with the whole metagenome shotgun sequencing approach. This
study aimed to investigate the feasibility of a method for metagenomic
analysis of microbial composition and ARGs in the outdoor air. Air
samples were collected with a Harvard impactor in the PM10 range at 50 m
from a hospital in Budapest. From the DNA yielded from samples of PM10
fraction single-end reads were generated with an Ion Torrent sequencer.
During the metagenomic analysis, reads were classified taxonomically.
The core bacteriome was defined. Reads were assembled to contigs and the
ARG content was analyzed. The dominant genera in the core bacteriome
were Bacillus, Acinetobacter, Leclercia and Paenibacillus. Among the
identified ARGs best hits were vanRA, Bla1, mphL, Escherichia coli EF-Tu
mutants conferring resistance to Pulvomycin, BcI, FosB, and mphM.
Despite the low DNA content of the samples of PM10 fraction, the number
of detected airborne ARGs was surprisingly high.