Selection for high-level telithromycin resistance in Staphylococcus aureus yields mutants resulting from an rplB-to-rplV gene conversion-like event.

While most Staphylococcus aureus telithromycin-resistant mutants isolated in this study possessed duplications within rplV (encoding ribosomal protein L22), four isolates possessed insertions within rplV that were identical to a portion of the gene rplB (encoding ribosomal protein L2). This novel type of mutation is the result of an apparent gene conversion-like event.