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Neisseria meningitidis: using genomics to understand diversity, evolution and pathogenesis

Nature Reviews Microbiology volume 18, pages 84–96 (2020)Cite this article

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Abstract

Meningococcal disease remains an important cause of morbidity and death worldwide despite the development and increasing implementation of effective vaccines. Elimination of the disease is hampered by the enormous diversity and antigenic variability of the causative agent, Neisseria meningitidis, one of the most variable bacteria in nature. These features are attained mainly through high rates of horizontal gene transfer and alteration of protein expression through phase variation. The recent availability of whole-genome sequencing (WGS) of large-scale collections of N. meningitidis isolates from various origins, databases to facilitate storage and sharing of WGS data and the concomitant development of effective bioinformatics tools have led to a much more thorough understanding of the diversity of the species, its evolution and population structure and how virulent traits may emerge. Implementation of WGS is already contributing to enhanced epidemiological surveillance and is essential to ascertain the impact of vaccination strategies. This Review summarizes the recent advances provided by WGS studies in our understanding of the biology of N. meningitidis and the epidemiology of meningococcal disease.

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Fig. 1: Overview of Neisseria meningitidis transmission, carriage state, invasion and virulence factors of the meningococcal outer membrane.
Fig. 2: Phylogenetic network of the relationships between species in the genus Neisseria.
Fig. 3: Phylogenetic networks of Neisseria meningitidis at different resolutions.
Fig. 4: Restriction-modification systems in Neisseria meningitidis.
Fig. 5: Overview of the pan-genome content of 11 closed genomes of Neisseria meningitidis.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division for Infection Control and Environmental Health, Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Oslo, Norway

    Dominique A. Caugant & Ola B. Brynildsrud

  2. Department of Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Dominique A. Caugant

  3. Department of Food Safety and Infection Biology, Faculty of Veterinary Science, Norwegian University of Life Science, Oslo, Norway

    Ola B. Brynildsrud

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The authors contributed equally to all aspects of the article.

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Related links

NeisseriaPubMLST database: https://pubmlst.org/neisseria/

Glossary

Meninges

The membranes surrounding the brain and spinal cord.

Fulminant

Coming on suddenly and with great severity.

Core genome

The set of genes that are present in all (or nearly all) strains of a species or population.

Dental calculus

A form of hardened dental plaque that is caused by precipitation of minerals from saliva and gingival fluid on the teeth.

Multilocus enzyme electrophoresis

A method for characterizing organisms by the relative mobilities under electrophoresis of a large number of intracellular enzymes.

Multilocus sequence typing

A procedure to characterize microbial isolates using the DNA sequences of internal fragments of multiple housekeeping genes.

DNA uptake sequences

Small repeated sequences that are required for DNA binding or uptake in natural transformation in members of the genus Neisseria.

Pan-genome

The sum of genes that are found in at least one strain of a species or population. In addition to the core genome, this includes the accessory genome, which contains dispensable genes present in a subset of the strains.

Simple sequence repeats

DNA tracts in which a short base pair motif is repeated several times, which can be found within the open reading frame or within the promoter region of a gene.

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Caugant, D.A., Brynildsrud, O.B. Neisseria meningitidis: using genomics to understand diversity, evolution and pathogenesis. Nat Rev Microbiol 18, 84–96 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41579-019-0282-6

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