Escherichia albertii as a potential enteropathogen

Escherichia albertii is the second, after Escherichia coli, pathogenic species in the Escherichia genus, and is regarded as an emerging enteropathogen of human and birds. E. albertii, similarly to enteropathogenic (EPEC) and enterohemorrhagic (EHEC) E. coli strains, possesses a specific intestinal cell invasion mechanism, known as A/E lesions(attaching and effacing lesions), characterised by intimate attachment of bacteria to the residual apical enterocyte membrane and localised destruction of brush border microvilli. To date, only a limited number of publications are available about this bacterium due to the late recognition of E. albertii as a new species (2003 year) and the lack of its standard identification methods. Therefore, it is unclear how common this new species is in food and clinical samples and whether all human faecal strains are associated with diarrheal cases. Nevertheless, E. albertii seems to be similar to pathogenic E. coli strains, not only in terms of virulence, but also reservoirs and ways of transmission, where animals, particularly birds and contaminated food possibly play an essential role. Thus, the aim of our project is to solve these issues, based on epidemiological and molecular studies, including whole genome sequencing and bioinformatic analysis of E. albertii genomes isolated from humans, animals, food and environmental samples.