To our knowledge, this is the first description of enterococci isolated from fresh milk of healthy canine, feline and porcine hosts. Some E. faecium and E. faecalis strains from colostrum and milk of healthy women have been described previously [14–16, 47]. In relation to ewe’s milk, a pilot study showed that enterococci were present in excess of 2 × 102 CFU/ml in 15% of the samples of unpasteurized milk from goats and ewes in England and Wales [48]. Other study focused on the identification of indigenous lactic acid bacteria in four samples of fresh ewe’s raw milk and four samples

of derived artisanal cheese from Argentina revealed that 48% and 59%, respectively, of the isolates obtained belonged to the genus Enterococcus[49]. The E. faecalis strains analyzed in this work possessed Autophagy Compound Library purchase PCI-34051 price some potential virulence determinants, including all

the sex pheromone determinants, but the gene encoding cytolysin (cylA) could only be Crenolanib detected in 7 strains. The results for the rest of the enterococcal genes were variable depending on the strains. On the other hand, only the efaA fm gene could be detected among the E. faecium isolates. These results are similar to those obtained in previous studies with enterococcal strains isolated from human colostrum and milk [14–16]. The role of adhesin EfaA fm in virulence has not yet been demonstrated, in contrast to the Esp surface protein. In the absence

of other virulence determinants, presence of efaA fm seems to have no value as a risk indicator since this gene was also found in 100% of starter E. faecium strains with a long record of safe use in food [22]. The results also agree with those obtained in other studies focused on foodborne enterococci in the sense that E. faecalis strains harbor multiple virulence determinants with a much higher incidence than in other enterococcal species [23]. A great diversity of E. faecalis and E. faecium clones were detected circulating in the milk environments Branched chain aminotransferase of different origins including three that have not been described previously. Some of the clones were common in different animal species as it was the case of E. faecalis-ST21, which was detected among porcine and feline isolates, or E. faecalis-ST9 among porcine and ovine ones. The sequence types found among the human isolates were only observed in milk samples of this origin. It is of interest to remark that two of the STs detected among E. faecalis strains of porcine or feline origin are included in clonal complexes (CC16 and CC21) that are frequently detected in human infections in Europe [50]. In addition, it should be highlighted that the hospital-associated lineages of E. faecalis (ST21 and ST16) and E.