ABSTRACT
Staphyloccus aureus is a ubiquitous organism, which can be part of the normal flora, but is also one of the commonest pathogens, causing infections ranging from mild skin sepsis to devastating life-threatening infections. It can attack the human host in many ways, still incompletely understood, and is capable of meeting most challenges. Sequencing of its genome showed that around 20 per cent consists of very variable genetic elements that spread extensively between strains, which may indicate why it is so successful (Holden et al., 2004).
