Genetic characteristics, antimicrobial resistance, and prevalence of Arcobacter spp. isolated from various sources in Shenzhen, China.

spp. is a globally emerging zoonotic and foodborne pathogen. However, little is known about its prevalence and antimicrobial resistance in China. To investigate the prevalence of spp. isolated from various sources, 396 samples were collected from human feces, chicken cecum, and food specimens including chicken meat, beef, pork, lettuce, and seafood. spp. was isolated by the membrane filtration method. For 92 strains, the agar dilution method and next-generation sequencing were used to investigate their antimicrobial resistance and to obtain whole genome data, respectively. The virulence factor database (VFDB) was queried to identify virulence genes. ResFinder and the Comprehensive Antibiotic Resistance Database (CARD) were used to predict resistance genes. A phylogenetic tree was constructed using the maximum likelihood (ML) method with core single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). We found that 27.5% of the samples ( = 109) were positive for spp., comprising (53.0%), (39.6%), and (7.4%). Chicken meat had the highest prevalence (81.2%), followed by seafood (51.9%), pork (43.3%), beef (36.7%), lettuce (35.5%), chicken cecum (8%), and human fecal samples (0%, 0/159). Antimicrobial susceptibility tests revealed that 51 and 40 strains were resistant to streptomycin (98.1, 70%), clindamycin (94.1, 90%), tetracycline (64.7, 52.5%), azithromycin (43.1%, 15%), nalidixic acid (33.4, 35%), and ciprofloxacin (31.3, 35%) but were susceptible to erythromycin, gentamicin, chloramphenicol, telithromycin, and clindamycin (≤10%). was sensitive to all experimental antibiotics. The virulence factors A, , and were carried by all spp. strains at 100%, and the following percentages were (95.7%), (23.9%), 2.2%, and (1.1%). Only one strain (F061-2G) carried a macrolide resistance gene (). One and one harbored resistance island gene clusters, which were isolated from pork and chicken. Phylogenetic tree analysis revealed that , and were separated from each other. To our knowledge, this is the first report of the isolation of spp. from vegetables and seafood in China. The resistance island gene cluster found in pork and chicken meat and the presence of virulence factors could be a potential risk to human health.