ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Microbiol.
Sec. Microbial Physiology and Metabolism
Genome Organization, Virulence Genes, and Temperature-Dependent Motility of an Emerging Pathogen, Escherichia marmotae
Provisionally accepted
- 1Department of Biochemistry, Microbiology & Immunology, School of Medicine, Wayne State University, Detroit, United States
- 2Wayne State University, Detroit, United States
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Escherichia marmotae is a member of the Escherichia cryptic clades (Walk et al., 2009) that were first isolated from animal feces and environmental waters. E. marmotae has recently emerged as an organism of concern due to its association with human infections. E. marmotae was called "cryptic" because it could not be distinguished from E. coli by standard diagnostic tests, except that it was clearly different genetically, differing in pairwise identity from E. coli over their entire genomes by an average of 10%. This study investigates genomic and phenotypic characteristics that may distinguish E. marmotae from E. coli, including the presence of virulence and antimicrobial resistance genes, and temperature-dependent motility and biofilm formation. Pan-genome analysis revealed that >75% of the E. marmotae genome consists of core genes, and the genome also contains many accessory genes, including plasmids and antimicrobial resistance genes. E. marmotae is resistant to erythromycin. E. marmotae had all genes needed for complete flagellar gene assembly, and phenotypically was motile at 28°C, and much less motile at 37°C. More biofilm formation was observed at 28ºC than at 37ºC. The expression of motility genes motA and fliA decreased at 37ºC in E. marmotae compared to E. coli. These temperature-sensitive traits may support environmental persistence and adaptations that may facilitate E. marmotae to cause human disease.
Keywords: Escherichia marmotae, RT-qPCR, motility, Virulence, Biofilm formation
Received: 21 Oct 2025; Accepted: 17 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Oladipo, Jomaa, Withey and Ram. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Pelumi Magret Oladipo, hl8030@wayne.edu
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