Antimicrobial Resistance Prediction for Gram-Negative Bacteria via Game Theory-Based Feature Evaluation

Sci Rep. 2019 Oct 9;9(1):14487. doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-50686-z.

Abstract

The increasing prevalence of antimicrobial-resistant bacteria drives the need for advanced methods to identify antimicrobial-resistance (AMR) genes in bacterial pathogens. With the availability of whole genome sequences, best-hit methods can be used to identify AMR genes by differentiating unknown sequences with known AMR sequences in existing online repositories. Nevertheless, these methods may not perform well when identifying resistance genes with sequences having low sequence identity with known sequences. We present a machine learning approach that uses protein sequences, with sequence identity ranging between 10% and 90%, as an alternative to conventional DNA sequence alignment-based approaches to identify putative AMR genes in Gram-negative bacteria. By using game theory to choose which protein characteristics to use in our machine learning model, we can predict AMR protein sequences for Gram-negative bacteria with an accuracy ranging from 93% to 99%. In order to obtain similar classification results, identity thresholds as low as 53% were required when using BLASTp.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Algorithms
  • Amino Acid Sequence
  • Anti-Bacterial Agents / pharmacology
  • Bacterial Proteins / chemistry
  • Bacterial Proteins / genetics
  • Drug Resistance, Bacterial / genetics*
  • Enterobacter / drug effects
  • Enterobacter / genetics
  • Game Theory
  • Genes, Bacterial*
  • Gram-Negative Bacteria / drug effects*
  • Gram-Negative Bacteria / genetics*
  • Gram-Negative Bacteria / pathogenicity
  • Humans
  • Machine Learning
  • Pseudomonas / drug effects
  • Pseudomonas / genetics
  • Support Vector Machine
  • Vibrio / drug effects
  • Vibrio / genetics
  • Whole Genome Sequencing

Substances

  • Anti-Bacterial Agents
  • Bacterial Proteins