Journal of Infection and Molecular Biology

Research Article
J. Inf. Mol. Biol. 4 (1): 9 - 15
Http://dx.doi.org/10.14737/journal.jimb/2016/4.1.9.15
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Rasha Abd Elmonem Hassan Attia1, Abeer Elsayed Mahmoud1, Ragaa Mohamed Othman1, Ayat Abd Elrahman Sayed2

1Departments of Parasitology; 2Medical Biochemistry, Faculty of Medicine, Assiut University, Egypt.

Abstract | To initiate effective treatment and to prevent fatal complication, diagnosis of human trichinellosis at an early stage is essential. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) can be applied for early diagnosis of infection through amplification of Trichinella spiralis migratory larval DNA or their products from blood of infected mice. We evaluated the use of two PCR procedures for the detection of larval DNA from T. spiralis. Blood and plasma samples were collected from mice infected with 200 larvae of T. spiralis on days 4, 6, 14, 17 and 22 post infection (pi). PCR procedure with DNA extraction and direct PCR without DNA extraction were applied to amplify the target gene fragment (mitochondrial ATP6 synthase F0 subunit). PCR procedure with DNA extraction did detect T. spiralis migratory larval DNA in blood from days 4, 6, and 14 pi. PCR procedure without DNA extraction failed to amplify T. spiralis cell free DNA (cfDNA) from blood and plasma samples of infected mice. PCR assay with DNA extraction using ATP6 primers is a valuable procedure to detect T. spiralis migratory larval DNA in the blood of infected mice as early as day 4 and up to day 14 pi. Further validation of such assays on clinical samples would propose a promising diagnostic tool for the timely diagnosis of human trichinellosis.

Keywords | PCR, Cell free DNA, T. spiralis, Migratory larvae, Blood, Plasma