Using the class 1 integron-integrase gene as a proxy for anthropogenic pollution
By M. Gillings, W. Gaze, Amy Pruden, K. Smalla, James M. Tiedje, Yong-guan Zhu. The ISME Journal, 2014
1,152 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Around all human activity, there are zones of pollution with pesticides, heavy metals, pharmaceuticals, personal care products and the microorganisms associated with human waste streams and agriculture. This diversity of pollutants, whose concentration varies spatially and temporally, is a major challenge for monitoring. Here, we suggest that the relative abundance of the clinical class 1 integron-integrase gene, intI1, is a good proxy for pollution because: (1) intI1 is linked to genes conferring resistance to antibiotics, disinfectants and heavy metals; (2) it is found in a wide variety of pathogenic and nonpathogenic bacteria; (3) its abundance can change rapidly because its host cells can have rapid generation times and it can move between bacteria by horizontal gene transfer; and (4) a single DNA sequence variant of intI1 is now found on a wide diversity of xenogenetic elements, these being complex mosaic DNA elements fixed through the agency of human selection. Here we review the literature examining the relationship between anthropogenic impacts and the abundance of intI1, and outline an approach by which intI1 could serve as a proxy for anthropogenic pollution.
Subfields: Endocrinology, Molecular Medicine, Pollution
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/feb1d13eba2f93f58168662633faca27d11c4f7c
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Citations in the corpus
- Antibiotic Pollution in the Environment: From Microbial Ecology to Public Policy (2019, background): “Integrons are so strongly associated with antibiotic resistance that their characteristic int gene has been included in many resistance gene panels as a proxy for the presence of ARGs [53].”
- Co-occurrence of resistance genes to antibiotics, biocides and metals reveals novel insights into their co-selection potential (2015, neutral): “communities, mainly affected by anthropogenic activities [33–35].”
- Review of antibiotic resistance in China and its environment. (2018, positive): “The integrase gene ( intI 1), belonging to class 1 integrons, was proposed to serve as a proxy of pollution for resistant bacteria and other anthropogenic pollutants because of its rapid response to diverse environmental pressures (Gillings et al., 2015).”
- Co-selection of antibiotic and heavy metal resistance in freshwater bacteria (2016, background): “, 2010) and the frequency of class I integrons has been postulated as a good proxy for anthropogenic pollution in the environment (Gillings et al., 2015).”