Resumo

MEJIA, Ana María  e  TRIANA, Omar. Genetic variability of Trypanosoma cruzi in blood and organs of infected mice determined by LSSP-PCR. Biomédica [online]. 2005, vol.25, n.1, pp.76-86. ISSN 0120-4157.

Introduction: Chagas’ disease, caused by Trypanosoma cruzi, has a variable clinical course, ranging from asymptomatic infection to chronic disease. T. cruzi has a clonal population structure and infecting strains are often multiclonal. Genetic variability of T. cruzi could be one of the determinant factors of differential tissue tropism and consequently of the clinical forms of the disease. Objective: To genetically characterize the parasites of two Colombian Trypanosoma cruzi strains in blood and organs of experimentally infected mice. Materials and methods: Mice were infected with two Colombian T. cruzi strains to determine the infection in blood and organs. The sensitivity of three different molecular markers was evaluated, and the genetic variability of the clones was determined. The latter was attained by means of low-stringency single specific primer polymerase chain reaction (LSSP-PCR) using kinetoplast DNA (kDNA) marker. The kDNA signatures obtained with the LSSP-PCR were analyzed by neighbor-joining. Results and conclusions: Our results confirmed the presence of the two lineages of T. cruzi and the multiclonal character of the two strains. The most sensitive marker was the kDNA. The most affected organ was the heart, which showed the greatest number of positive results with the three markers. There were genetic differences between the clones found in blood and organs of infected mice. Overall, these results support the use of the LSSP-PCR technique for the study of the molecular epidemiology of Chagas’ disease.

Palavras-chave : Trypanosoma cruzi; genetic variability; LSSP-PCR; kinetoplast DNA; Chagas’ disease..

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