Typing of Staphylococcus aureus by amplification of the 16S-23S rRNA intergenic spacer sequences

The possibility of using polymorphisms in the spacer regions between 16S and 23S rRNA genes in order to type Staphylococcus aureus has been evaluated. To this purpose, DNA extracted from 74 independent isolates was amplified making use of a pair of primers complementary to conserved regions in the 16S and 23S genes. We have demonstrated that the method provides a good discrimination between unrelated isolates, giving better results when methicillin-sensitive strains are considered. Moreover, the amplification profiles were reproducible and all strains were typable. Given these results, and the technical simplicity of the process, we propose PCR-ribotyping to be taken into consideration as a method for typing S. aureus.