Abstract
ITALIC! Shigella boydiiis one of the four ITALIC! Shigellaspecies that causes disease worldwide; however, there are few published studies that examine the genomic variation of this species. This study compares genomes of 72 total isolates; 28 ITALIC! S. boydiifrom Bangladesh and The Gambia that were recently isolated as part of the Global Enteric Multicenter Study (GEMS), 14 historical ITALIC! S. boydiigenomes in the public domain and 30 ITALIC! Escherichia coliand ITALIC! Shigellareference genomes that represent the genomic diversity of these pathogens. This comparative analysis of these 72 genomes identified that the ITALIC! S. boydiiisolates separate into three phylogenomic clades, each with specific gene content. Each of the clades contains ITALIC! S. boydiiisolates from geographic and temporally distant sources, indicating that the ITALIC! S. boydiiisolates from the GEMS are representative of ITALIC! S. boydii.This study describes the genome sequences of a collection of novel ITALIC! S. boydiiisolates and provides insight into the diversity of this species in comparison to the ITALIC! E. coliand other ITALIC! Shigellaspecies.