Leptospira kirschneri
is one of the pathogenic species of the
Leptospira
genus. Human and animal infection from
L.
kirschneri gained further attention over the last few decades. Here we present the isolation and characterisation of Brazilian
L.
kirschneri serogroup Pomona serovar Mozdok strain M36/05 and the comparative genomic analysis with Brazilian
human strain 61H. The M36/05 strain caused pulmonary hemorrhagic lesions in the hamster model, showing high
virulence. The studied genomes presented high symmetrical identity and the
in silico multilocus sequence typing analysis
resulted in a new allelic profile (ST101) that so far has only been associated with the Brazilian
L.
kirschneri serogroup
Pomona serovar Mozdok strains. Considering the environmental conditions and high genomic similarity observed between
strains, we suggest the existence of a Brazilian
L.
kirschneri serogroup Pomona serovar Mozdok lineage that could
represent a high public health risk; further studies are necessary to confirm the lineage significance and distribution.
