Occurrence of antilisterial structural bacteriocins genes in meat borne lactic acid bacteria

The ability to inhibit the growth of Listeria cells and the presence of bacteriocin encoding genes was examined in 115 LAB strains isolated from Argentinean vacuum-packaged beef and different traditional fermented sausages. Lactobacillus (L) sakei, Lactobacillus (L) curvatus and Enterococcus (E) faecium showed a great inhibition of all Listeria strains evaluated while Pediococcus (P) acidilactici and Lactobacillus (L) plantarum demonstrated a limited or absent antilisterial activity. Both L. curvatus and L. sakei carried the sppA, sppQ and sapA structural genes, encoding for sakacin P, sakacin Q and curvacin A bacteriocins, respectively. Whilst L. curvatus exhibited a higher occurrence of these genes, L. sakei strains were more effective at inhibiting Listeria (L) strains, Listeria monocytogenes UC8159 and Listeria innocua 7 being the most sensitive to these bacteriocins. Among analyzed E. faecium strains, the wide distribution of entA, entB and entP genes accounted for the high antilisterial activity particularly observed against L. monocytogenes FBUNT. The structural gene plantEF was mostly present in Lactobacillus plantarum strains and no pedA gene was found in P. acidilactici evaluated strains. The antilisterial potential of L. sakei and E. faecium offers great possibilities for the meat industry as biopreservative cultures, although more studies are needed in order to conclude about this issue.