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Identification of Clinical Trichosporon asteroides Strains by MALDI-TOF Mass Spectrometry: Evaluation of the Bruker Daltonics Commercial System and an In-House Developed Library

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Abstract

Trichosporon asteroides is an emerging yeast-like pathogen commonly misidentified by commercial biochemical identification systems. We evaluated the performance of matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry for the identification of 21 clinical T. asteroides strains using the Bruker Daltonics database (BDAL) and an in-house developed library. Mass spectra were obtained by the FlexControl system v.3.4, and characterizations were performed in the Biotyper BDAL database v.4.1 and the developed in-house library. Species identification for T. asteroides failed as all 21 strains were misidentified as T. japonicum (log-scores 1.89–2.19). Extending the existing database was crucial to achieving 100% correct species-level identification and accurate distinction between species. Our results indicate that the commercial BDAL database has no discriminatory power to distinguish between T. japonicum and T. asteroides. Whereas improvement of the current BDAL database is pending, we strongly advise system users not to exclude the possibility of the failure to report T. asteroides.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to the Members of the Trichosporon Brazil Network: Northeast region: Guilherme M. Chaves (Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Norte, Natal); Ana Verena A. Mendes, Marcio de Oliveira Silva and Maria Goreth de Andrade Barberino (Hospital São Rafael de Salvador, Salvador, Brazil); Rejane Pereira Neves (Universidade Federal de Pernambuco, Recife); Monica Borges Botura (Hospital de Clínicas, Universidade Federal da Bahia). Midwest region: Rosane C. Hahn (Universidade Federal de Mato Grosso, Cuiabá). Southeast region: João Nóbrega de Almeida Junior Universidade Federal de São Paulo, São Paulo); Vinicius Ponzio (Hospital Nove de Julho, São Paulo), Paulo de Tarso O. e Castro (Hospital de Câncer de Barretos, Barretos, São Paulo); Thais Guimarães (Hospital do Servidor Público Estadual de São Paulo, São Paulo); Daniel Wagner Santos (Universidade Federal de São Paulo, São Paulo); Bianca Grassi de Miranda (Hospital Samaritano, São Paulo); Ivan Leonardo A França E Silva (A.C. Camargo Cancer Center, São Paulo); Fabianne Carlesse (Departamento de Pediatria, Escola Paulista de Medicina-Universidade Federal de São Paulo, São Paulo and Instituto de Oncologia Pediátrica-IOP-GRAACC-UNIFESP, São Paulo); Jéssica Fernandes Ramos (Hospital Sírio Libanês, São Paulo and Hospital de Clínicas, Hospital das Clínicas da FMUSP, São Paulo). South region: Flávio Queiroz-Telles (Universidade Federal do Paraná, Curitiba, Paraná); Valério Rodrigues Aquino (Hospital das Clínicas de Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul); Fabio Araújo Motta (Hospital Pequeno Príncipe, Curitiba); Alexandre Vargas Schwarzbold (Universidade Federal de Santa Maria, Santa Maria, Brazil); Jamile Sardi Perozin (Hospital do Câncer de Londrina, Londrina).

Funding

The study was partially supported by a grant received from Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq 484020/2013-7 and CNPq 307510/2015-8). ECF received a fellowship from Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP 2020/14097-0 and 2019/24960-0).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Infectious Diseases, Escola Paulista de Medicina - Universidade Federal de São Paulo, São Paulo, 04024-002, Brazil

    Elaine Cristina Francisco & Arnaldo Lopes Colombo

  2. Department of Medical Mycology, Westerdijk Fungal Biodiversity Institute, Uppsalalaan 8, 3584 CT, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Elaine Cristina Francisco, Mexx Ebbing & Ferry Hagen

  3. Institute of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics (IBED), University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Ferry Hagen

  4. Department of Medical Microbiology, University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Ferry Hagen

Authors
  1. Elaine Cristina Francisco
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  2. Mexx Ebbing
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  3. Arnaldo Lopes Colombo
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  4. Ferry Hagen
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Consortia

Trichosporon Brazilian Network

  • Guilherme M. Chaves
  • , Ana Verena A. Mendes
  • , Marcio de Oliveira Silva
  • , Maria Goreth de Andrade Barberino
  • , Rejane Pereira Neves
  • , Monica Borges Botura
  • , Rosane C. Hahn
  • , João Nóbrega de Almeida Junior
  • , Vinicius Ponzio
  • , Paulo de Tarso O. e Castro
  • , Thais Guimarães
  • , Daniel Wagner Santos
  • , Bianca Grassi de Miranda
  • , Ivan Leonardo A França E Silva
  • , Fabianne Carlesse
  • , Jéssica Fernandes Ramos
  • , Flávio Queiroz-Telles
  • , Valério Rodrigues Aquino
  • , Fabio Araújo Motta
  • , Alexandre Vargas Schwarzbold
  •  & Jamile Sardi Perozin

Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by ECF and ME. The first draft of the manuscript was written by ECF and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Elaine Cristina Francisco or Ferry Hagen.

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Conflict of interest

Arnaldo Lopes Colombo receive educational grants from Eurofarma, Biotoscana-Knight, United Medical-Knight, Gilead, and Pfizer. The other authors report no conflicts of interest that may be relevant to this article. Ferry Hagen is Associate Editor for the journal Mycopathologia. The authors declare that there are no other competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the research reported here.

Ethical Approval

The study was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of Universidade Federal de São Paulo (Approval Number 6183240519/2019).

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Handling Editor: Takashi Sugita.

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Francisco, E.C., Ebbing, M., Colombo, A.L. et al. Identification of Clinical Trichosporon asteroides Strains by MALDI-TOF Mass Spectrometry: Evaluation of the Bruker Daltonics Commercial System and an In-House Developed Library. Mycopathologia 188, 243–249 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11046-023-00723-3

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