Critical roles of cyanobacteria as reservoir and source for antibiotic resistance genes

Abstract The widespread occurrence of antibiotic resistance genes (ARGs) throughout aquatic environments has raised global concerns for public health, but understanding of the emergence and propagation of ARGs in diverse environmental media remains limited. This study investigated the occurrence and spatio-temporal patterns of six classes of ARGs in cyanobacteria isolated from Taihu Lake. Tetracycline and sulfonamide resistance genes were identified as dominant ARGs. The abundance of ARGs in cyanobacteria was significantly higher in the bloom period than in the non-bloom period. The contribution and persistence of ARGs were higher in extracellular DNA (eDNA) than in intracellular DNA (iDNA) from cyanobacteria. Cyanobacteria-associated eDNA carrying ARGs was more stable at lower temperature. The relative abundances of ARGs in Microcystis and Synechococcus, the dominant genera of cyanobacterial blooms in Taihu Lake, were significantly higher than those in other cyanobacterial strains. The conjugative transfer efficiency for bacterial assimilation of ARGs in cyanobacteria was facilitated by increasing temperature and cyanobacterial cell concentration. Our results demonstrated that cyanobacteria could act as a significant reservoir and source for the acquisition and dissemination of ARGs in aquatic environments, hence the definition of negative ecological effects of cyanobacterial blooms was expanded.