Figure 4. Mouse urinary tract colonisation by E. coli EC958 and ST131 strains.
A minimum of eight C57BL/6 mice were transurethrally inoculated with ∼5×108 CFU of each ST131 strain. After 18 h urine and bladder homogenate samples were plated on LB agar in triplicate for determination of bacterial loads. Data are presented as log CFU per ml of urine or 0.1 g of tissue. Bladder (A) and urine (B) bacterial loads of ‘fim-enriched’ ST131 strains EC958, S47 and S52 determined following shaking or static growth of the culture inoculum. Bladder (C) and urine (D) bacterial loads of S15, S19 (‘fim-on’) and S1, S27 (‘fim-off’) ST131 strains. (E) Bladder and urine bacterial loads of B36 following shaking and static growth. B36 is an ST131 ‘fim-enriched’ strain from our Australian collection. Equality of group medians was tested using the Mann-Whitney nonparametric test. Shown P values<0.05 are considered significant.