Molecular Analysis of Bacterial Microbiota on Brazilian Currency Note Surfaces

Author(s)

Pereira da Fonseca, Tairacan Augusto ^[1] ; Pessoa, Rodrigo ^[1] ; Sanabani, Sabri Saeed ^{[2, 1]}

Affiliation

^[1] Univ Sao Paulo, Sch Med, Hosp Clin HC, Clin Lab, Dept Pathol, BR-05403000 Sao Paulo - Brazil

^[2] Univ Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo Inst Trop Med, BR-05403000 Sao Paulo - Brazil

• Document type: Journal article
• Source: INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH AND PUBLIC HEALTH; v. 12, n. 10, p. 13276-13288, OCT 2015.
• Web of Science Citations: 6

Abstract

Currency notes have been implicated as a vehicle for transmitting community-acquired bacterial infections. However, the overall diversity of the bacterial population residing on banknotes is still unknown in Brazil. In this study, we aimed to investigate the overall bacterial population from 150 different Brazilian Rial (R\$) notes in circulation using a culture-independent Illumina massively parallel sequencing approach of the 16S rRNA genes. Samples were randomly collected from three different street markets or feiras in the metropolitan region of SAo Paulo. Taxonomical composition revealed the abundance of Proteobacteria phyla, followed by Firmicutes and Streptophyta, with a total of 1193 bacterial families and 3310 bacterial genera. Most of these bacterial genera are of human, animal, and environmental origins. Also, our analysis revealed the presence of some potential pathogenic bacterial genera including Salmonella, Staphylococcus, and Klebsiella. The results demonstrate that there is a tremendous diversity of bacterial contamination on currency notes, including organisms known to be opportunistic pathogens. One of the factors that may contribute to the richness of bacterial diversity in currency notes is personal hygiene. Thus, our results underscore the need to increase public awareness of the importance of personal hygiene of money handlers who also handle food. (AU)

• FAPESP's process: 11/12297-2 - Profiling the human T-cells miRNA, REX and tax transcriptomes in the course of HTLV-1 infection using a deep sequencing approach
• Grantee: Sabri Saeed Mohamed Ahmed Al-Sanabani
• Support type: Regular Research Grants
• FAPESP's process: 11/11090-5 - Complete genomes for HIV: viral genetic diversity among seropositive first-time blood donors in four blood centres in Brazil
• Grantee: Sabri Saeed Mohamed Ahmed Al-Sanabani
• Support type: Regular Research Grants