Differentiation of environmental and clinical isolates of Vibrio mimicus from Vibrio cholerae by multilocus enzyme electrophoresis

In this study, we demonstrated that analyzed strains of Vibrio mimicus and Vibrio cholerae could be separated in two groups by using multilocus enzyme electrophoresis (MEE) data from 14 loci. We also showed that the combinati on of four enzymatic loci enables us to differentiate these two species. Ou r results showed that the ribosomal intergenic spacer regions PCR-mediated identification system failed, in some cases, to differentiate between V. mi micus and V. cholerae. On the other hand, MEE proved to be a powerful molec ular tool for the discrimination of these hvo species even when atypical st rains were analyzed.