Deciphering the unexplored Leptospira diversity from soils uncovers genomic evolution to virulence
Abstract
Despite recent advances in our understanding of Leptospira genomics, little is known on how virulence has emerged in this heterogeneous bacterial genus as well as on the lifestyle of pathogenic Leptospira outside animal hosts. Here, we isolated 12 novel Leptospira species from tropical soils, significantly increasing the number of known species to 35 and evidencing a highly unexplored biodiversity in the genus. Extended comparative phylogenomics and pan-genome analyses at the genus level by incorporating 26 new genomes, revealed that, the traditional leptospiral " pathogens " cluster, as defined by their phylogenetic position, can be split in two groups with distinct virulence potential and accessory gene patterns. These genomic distinctions are strongly linked to the ability
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