Papers by Maurice Boissinot
Additional file 8: of Culture-enriched human gut microbiomes reveal core and accessory resistance genes
Table S4. Number of resistance genes observed per culture-independent or culture-enriched microbi... more Table S4. Number of resistance genes observed per culture-independent or culture-enriched microbiomes with 70 percent identity to reference resistance genes from MERGEM. (XLSX 14 kb)
Frontiers in Veterinary Science
Ó The Author(s) 2010. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Abstract We ... more Ó The Author(s) 2010. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com Abstract We explore a new calibration-free approach to biodetection based on whispering gallery modes (WGMs) without a reference measure and relative shifts. Thus, the requirement to keep track of the sensor position is removed, and a freely moving population of fluorophoredoped polystyrene microspheres can now fulfill this role of sensing resonator. Breaking free from fixed surface-based biosensing promotes adhesion between the microsphere sensors and the analytes since both can now be thoroughly mixed. The 70-nm-wide spectrum of green fluorescent microbeads allows us to monitor over 20 WGMs simultaneously without needing evanescent light coupling into the microspheres, hence enabling remote sensing. Since the exact radius of each microsphere is unknown a priori, it requires algorithmic analyses to obtain a reliable result for the refractive index of a solution. We first test our approach with diff...
Water Practice and Technology
Drinking water of good quality is essential to ensure the health and economical sustainability of... more Drinking water of good quality is essential to ensure the health and economical sustainability of human communities worldwide. The assessment of drinking water microbial quality is generally performed by detecting and/or quantifying faecal contamination indicators which may not provide an adequate evaluation of the health risks posed by several waterborne pathogens, for example Norovirus, Vibrio cholerae, and Cryptosporidium. In many instances, decentralized testing done in a mobile or more compact laboratory could increase the speed and capacity of predicting (or determining the source of) waterborne disease outbreaks, while offering unique opportunities to sensitize and train local populations on water and health issues. In this work, we describe the water molecular microbiology programme of the classical and molecular microbiology module of the Atlantis mobile laboratory complex, as well as the scientific, operational and design requirements that served to build a quite unique in...
Structural and functional characterization of tnpI, a recombinase locus in Tn21 and related beta-lactamase transposons
Journal of Bacteriology
A novel discrete mobile DNA element from Tn21 from the plasmid R100.1 is described, and its mobil... more A novel discrete mobile DNA element from Tn21 from the plasmid R100.1 is described, and its mobilization function was confirmed experimentally. In addition, the element behaves as a recombinase-active locus (tnpI) which facilitates insertions of antibiotic resistance genes as modules or cassettes at defined hot spots or integration sites. A similar tnpI sequence was detected by DNA hybridization in a series of beta-lactamase transposons and plasmids and localized on their physical maps. The genetic function of the locus cloned from Tn21 into pACYC184 was tested for conduction and integration into the plasmids R388 and pOX38Km, and the results suggested recombinase-integrase activity and recA independence. DNA sequence analysis of the tnpI locus revealed no inverted or direct terminal repeats or transposition features of class I and class II transposons. The coding capacity revealed three putative open reading frames encoding 131, 134, and 337 amino acids. Orf3 encoded a putative pol...
DNA-chromic cationic polythiophene derivative
DNA based radiological dosimetry technology
Antibiotics
Carbapenemase-producing Enterobacterales, including KPC-2 producers, have become a major clinical... more Carbapenemase-producing Enterobacterales, including KPC-2 producers, have become a major clinical problem. During an outbreak in Quebec City, Canada, KPC-2-producing Klebsiella michiganensis and Citrobacter farmeri were isolated from a patient six weeks apart. We determined their complete genome sequences. Both isolates carried nearly identical IncN2 plasmids with blaKPC-2 on a Tn4401b element. Both strains also carried IncP1 plasmids, but that of C. farmeri did not carry a Beta-lactamase gene, whereas that of K. michiganensis carried a second copy of blaKPC-2 on Tn4401b. These results suggest recent plasmid transfer between the two species and a recent transposition event.
CD4 deletion mutants evaluated for human immunodeficiency virus type 1 infectivity in a highly efficient system of expression and detection based on LTR-dependent reporter gene activation
Journal of Virological Methods, 1997
The human CD4 glycoprotein is thought to be involved at several stages of the infection process w... more The human CD4 glycoprotein is thought to be involved at several stages of the infection process with the human immunodeficiency virus type 1. To pursue this line of investigation with CD4 deletion mutants, we combined a system of high transient cell-surface expression of the target molecule with an assay of HIV-1 infectivity based on induction of LTR-linked luciferase activity. The approach was also designed to distinguish between defects in gp120 binding and postbinding events. Optimal assay conditions were established with wild-type CD4 and the previously characterized CD4 mutant, d367-371. New deletions of CD4 domains D3 and D4 were then designed from a rat model of the D3D4 atomic coordinates with the concern of maintaining overall structural integrity. While all CD4 mutants were found to be defective towards HIV, it was demonstrated that the mutations affected different stages of the entry process. These data indicate that the system is well suited for studying the intricacy of molecular interactions involving HIV envelope glycoproteins and its receptors.
ABSTRACTThe identification of microbial species in biological samples is essential to many applic... more ABSTRACTThe identification of microbial species in biological samples is essential to many applications in health, food safety and environment. MALDI-TOF MS technology has become a tool of choice for microbial identification but it has several drawbacks including: it requires a long step of bacterial culture prior to analysis (24h), it has a low specificity and is not quantitative. We have developed a new strategy for identifying bacterial species in biological samples using specific LC-MS/MS peptidic signatures. In the first training step, deep proteome coverage of bacteria of interest is obtained in Data Independent Acquisition (DIA) mode, followed by the use of machine learning to define the peptides the most susceptible to distinguish each bacterial species from the others. Then, in the second step, this peptidic signature is monitored in biological samples using targeted proteomics. This method, which allows the bacterial identification from clinical specimens in less than 4h, ...
Water Quality Research Journal
Access to safe drinking water is a major concern for Canada's First Nations. The main objecti... more Access to safe drinking water is a major concern for Canada's First Nations. The main objective of this report was to evaluate the microbiological quality of raw source water used for drinking purposes by the Cree people of Mistissini (Province of Québec, Canada) during summer 2005. Twelve environmental sites and 24 portable water containers used for domestic water collection and storage were sampled and submitted to microbiological determination of total coliforms, Escherichia coli, and Enterococcus sp. using membrane filtration and colourimetric standard methods. The results suggest that the microbiological quality of raw source water sampled from environmental sites is enhanced by storage practices of Mistissini inhabitants as microbial counts have shown a tendency to decrease upon storage and that the targeted fecal indicators (E. coli and enterococci) were quantitatively distributed independently from each other, especially with regards to the type of water source. In concl...
Method for isolation of both lactose-fermenting and – non-fermenting Escherichia albertii strains from stool samples
Journal of Microbiological Methods
Genome announcements, Jan 5, 2017
Romboutsia weinsteinii sp. nov. CCRI-19649(T) belongs to the genus Romboutsia The strain was isol... more Romboutsia weinsteinii sp. nov. CCRI-19649(T) belongs to the genus Romboutsia The strain was isolated from a water sample harvested in Québec City, Québec, Canada. The genome assembly comprised 4,134,593 bp with a 29.3% GC content. This is the first documentation that reports the genome sequence of R. weinsteinii.
Genome announcements, Jan 12, 2017
The Romboutsia maritimum sp. nov. CCRI-22766(T) strain was isolated from coastal estuarine mud in... more The Romboutsia maritimum sp. nov. CCRI-22766(T) strain was isolated from coastal estuarine mud in New Zealand. The genome assembly comprised 2,854,352 bp, with 27.1% G+C content. This is the first documentation that reports the genome sequence of R. maritimum.
Genome announcements, Jan 19, 2017
Lachnotalea glycerini CCRI-19302 belongs to the genus Lachnotalea The strain was isolated from a ... more Lachnotalea glycerini CCRI-19302 belongs to the genus Lachnotalea The strain was isolated from a water sample harvested in Québec City, Canada. The genome assembly comprised 4,694,231 bp, with 34.6% GC content. This is the first documentation to report the genome sequence of a sporulating and motile strain of L. glycerini.
Empowerment of Women: Closing the Medical Technologies Gender Gap
Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology Canada
Use of phylogenetical analysis to predict susceptibility of pathogenic Candida spp. to antifungal drugs
Journal of microbiological methods, Dec 3, 2016
Successful treatment of a Candida infection relies on 1) an accurate identification of the pathog... more Successful treatment of a Candida infection relies on 1) an accurate identification of the pathogenic fungus and 2) on its susceptibility to antifungal drugs. In the present study we investigated the level of correlation between phylogenetical evolution and susceptibility of pathogenic Candida spp. to antifungal drugs. For this, we compared a phylogenetic tree, assembled with the concatenated sequences (2475-bp) of the ATP2, TEF1, and TUF1 genes from 20 representative Candida species, with published minimal inhibitory concentrations (MIC) of the four principal antifungal drug classes commonly used in the treatment of candidiasis: polyenes, triazoles, nucleoside analogues, and echinocandins. The phylogenetic tree revealed three distinct phylogenetic clusters among Candida species. Species within a given phylogenetic cluster have generally similar susceptibility profiles to antifungal drugs and species within Clusters II and III were less sensitive to antifungal drugs than Cluster I s...
Gut microbes, Sep 2, 2016
Antibiotics profoundly affect the gut microbiome and modulate microbial communities. We recently ... more Antibiotics profoundly affect the gut microbiome and modulate microbial communities. We recently observed that antimicrobial drugs also impact the abundance and distribution of antibiotic resistance genes. In this addendum, we reanalyze our ∼1 trillion nucleotide shotgun metagenomic dataset to quantify comprehensive genomic differences at the sequence level before and after antibiotic treatment. We show that 7 day exposure to cefprozil leads to a statistically significant loss of metagenome sequences. Recovery of gut microbiomes 3 months after antibiotherapy was characterized by the emergence of new genome sequences not observed prior to antibiotic exposure. Participants with low initial gut microbiome diversity had an increased amount of sequences related to antibiotic resistance. Therefore, we suggest that while the taxonomical composition of microbiomes is partially affected by the antibiotic, the genomic content and population structure of bacterial communities is noticeably imp...
Genome announcements, 2016
Criibacterium bergeronii gen. nov., sp. nov., CCRI-22567 is the type strain of the new genus Crii... more Criibacterium bergeronii gen. nov., sp. nov., CCRI-22567 is the type strain of the new genus Criibacterium The strain was isolated from a woman with bacterial vaginosis. The genome assembly comprised 2,384,460 bp, with 34.4% G+C content. This is the first genome announcement of a strain belonging to the genus Criibacterium.
Int J Syst Evol Microbiol, 2005
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Papers by Maurice Boissinot