Toxin-Antitoxin Systems On PLasmids Carrying Antibiotic Resistance: A Comprehensive In Silico Analysis

Abstract

This study presents a reproducible Python-based pipeline to detect and annotate toxin–antitoxin (TA) systems on plasmids carrying antibiotic-resistance genes. Applying the pipeline to a curated set of 2,048 complete plasmids, the study found TA loci on 44.8% of plasmids and co-occurrence of TA and AMR genes on 28.9% of plasmids. Classical Type II TA families (e.g., MazE–MazF/PemK, ParE–ParD, CcdAB) and conserved bicistronic operons were the most frequent architectures. The results suggest TA systems commonly contribute to the maintenance and persistence of resistance plasmids and provide a reproducible framework for further experimental validation.