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Identification of Hylemonella gracilis as an Antagonist of Yersinia pestis Persistence

David R Pawlowski, Amy Raslawsky, Gretchen Siebert, Daniel J Metzger, Gerald B Koudelka and Richard J Karalus

Yersinia pestis , the etiological agent of plague, has garnered great interest in the Biological Defense community as its intentional release or use as a terror weapon could cause considerable morbidity while incurring incalculable financial costs for restoration and remediation efforts. The plague bacterium is thought to only persist within a host such as a flea or small mammal reservoir. Following an event such as an intentional release however, the plague bacterium would be spread throughout a number of atypical environments such as soil or water ecosystems. Recently, a small number of studies have been published describing the plague bacterium’s persistence in some of these atypical environments. Here we show that Y. pestis can colonize sterilized water microcosms for over 3 years yet when introduced to filtered fresh water microcosms the bacterium Hylemonella gracilis became the dominant bacterium in the microcosm, apparently preventing long-term Y. pestis persistence. The conditioning and outgrowth of H. gracilis on rich media is directly attributable and proportional to the introduction and concentration of Y. pestis to the microcosm.