{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,4,9]],"date-time":"2026-04-09T01:14:59Z","timestamp":1775697299981,"version":"3.50.1"},"reference-count":36,"publisher":"PeerJ","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2019,1,9]],"date-time":"2019-01-09T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1546992000000},"content-version":"unspecified","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"Institut Pasteur: PTR grant","award":["PTR30-17"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["PTR30-17"]}]},{"name":"Grant Agency of the Ministry of Health of the Czech Republic","award":["17-31333A"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["17-31333A"]}]},{"name":"Wellcome Trust Biomedical Resource Grant","award":["104992"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["104992"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":[],"abstract":"<jats:p>\n                    <jats:italic>Treponema pallidum<\/jats:italic>\n                    subsp.\n                    <jats:italic>pallidum<\/jats:italic>\n                    is the causative agent of syphilis, a sexually transmitted disease with worldwide prevalence. Several different molecular typing schemes are currently available for this pathogen. To enable population biology studies of the syphilis agent and for epidemiological surveillance at the global scale, a harmonized typing tool needs to be introduced. Recently, we published a new multi-locus sequence typing (MLST) with the potential to significantly enhance the epidemiological data in several aspects (e.g., distinguishing genetically different clades of syphilis, subtyping inside these clades, and finally, distinguishing different subspecies of non-cultivable pathogenic treponemes). In this short report, we introduce the PubMLST database for treponemal DNA data storage and for assignments of allelic profiles and sequencing types. Moreover, we have summarized epidemiological data of all treponemal strains (\n                    <jats:italic>n<\/jats:italic>\n                    = 358) with available DNA sequences in typing loci and found several association between genetic groups and characteristics of patients. This study proposes the establishment of a single MLST of\n                    <jats:italic>T. p. pallidum<\/jats:italic>\n                    and encourages researchers and public health communities to use this PubMLST database as a universal tool for molecular typing studies of the syphilis pathogen.\n                  <\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.7717\/peerj.6182","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2019,1,9]],"date-time":"2019-01-09T03:51:30Z","timestamp":1547005890000},"page":"e6182","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":32,"title":["A public database for the new MLST scheme for\n                    <i>Treponema pallidum<\/i>\n                    subsp.\n                    <i>pallidum<\/i>\n                    : surveillance and epidemiology of the causative agent of syphilis"],"prefix":"10.7717","volume":"6","author":[{"given":"Linda","family":"Grillova","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Biology of Spirochetes Unit, Institut Pasteur, Paris, France"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-0751-0287","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Keith","family":"Jolley","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"David","family":"\u0160majs","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Biology, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Mathieu","family":"Picardeau","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Biology of Spirochetes Unit, Institut Pasteur, Paris, France"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"4443","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2019,1,9]]},"reference":[{"key":"10.7717\/peerj.6182\/ref-1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"e000093","DOI":"10.1099\/mgen.0.000093","article-title":"Microreact: visualizing and sharing data for genomic epidemiology and phylogeography","volume":"2","author":"Argim\u00f3n","year":"2016","journal-title":"Microbial Genomics"},{"key":"10.7717\/peerj.6182\/ref-2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"16245","DOI":"10.1038\/nmicrobiol.2016.245","article-title":"Origin of modern syphilis and emergence of a pandemic Treponema pallidum cluster","volume":"2","author":"Arora","year":"2016","journal-title":"Nature Microbiology"},{"key":"10.7717\/peerj.6182\/ref-3","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"e011153-18","DOI":"10.1128\/mBio.01153-18","article-title":"Long-term in vitro culture of the syphilis spirochete Treponema pallidum subsp. pallidum","volume":"9","author":"Edmondson","year":"2018","journal-title":"American Society for Microbiology"},{"issue":"2","key":"10.7717\/peerj.6182\/ref-4","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"e0172905","DOI":"10.1371\/journal.pone.0172905","article-title":"Molecular typing of Treponema pallidum isolates from Buenos Aires, Argentina: frequent Nichols-like isolates and low levels of macrolide resistance","volume":"12","author":"Gallo Vaulet","year":"2017","journal-title":"PLOS ONE"},{"issue":"2","key":"10.7717\/peerj.6182\/ref-5","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"e00333-14","DOI":"10.1128\/genomeA.00333-14","article-title":"Complete genome sequence of the Treponema pallidum subsp. pallidum Sea81-4 Strain","volume":"2","author":"Giacani","year":"2014","journal-title":"Genome Announcements"},{"key":"10.7717\/peerj.6182\/ref-6","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"2645","DOI":"10.1128\/JB.00159-10","article-title":"Complete genome sequence and annotation of the Treponema pallidum subsp. pallidum Chicago strain","volume":"192","author":"Giacani","year":"2010","journal-title":"Journal of Bacteriology"},{"issue":"8","key":"10.7717\/peerj.6182\/ref-7","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"517","DOI":"10.1097\/OLQ.0000000000000474","article-title":"Treponema pallidum 11qj subtype may correspond to a Treponema pallidum subsp. 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