Differences among sublineages of the East-Asian lineage of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in genotypic clustering.
METHODS
The East-Asian lineage of Mycobacterium tuberculosis is composed of five sublineages, and includes the strains from the Beijing spoligotype family. In some studies these strains were highly pathogenic, although other studies did not support this finding.


OBJECTIVE
To determine if the sublineages of the East-Asian lineage of M. tuberculosis differ in their capacity to cause secondary cases, as assessed by genotypic clustering of isolates.


METHODS
In a population-based study of 545 patients with M. tuberculosis from the East-Asian lineage in San Francisco, we used DNA-based fingerprinting to identify genotypic clustering, which was compared among the different sublineages defined by large sequence polymorphism.


RESULTS
Strains from sublineage 207 had the highest frequency of genotypic clustering. In the multivariate analysis, only patients born in the United States were associated with clustering.


CONCLUSIONS
We found evidence in a univariate analysis that the different East-Asian sublineages of M. tuberculosis have different frequencies of genotypic clustering. The effect size for this difference was unchanged in multivariate analysis, although loss of observations due to missing data resulted in a non-significant P value. It is tantalizing to hypothesize that the different East-Asian sublineages may differ in their capacity to cause secondary cases.
Kato-Maeda
M
M
Francis J Curry National Tuberculosis Center, Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, San Francisco General Hospital, Department of Medicine, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California 94110, USA. midori.kato-maeda@ucsf.edu
Kim
E Y
EY
Flores
L
L
Jarlsberg
L G
LG
Osmond
D
D
Hopewell
P C
PC
D001483:Base Sequence; D016000:Cluster Analysis; D016172:DNA Fingerprinting; D004269:DNA, Bacterial / Q000032:analysis*; D005260:Female; D005838:Genotype; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D009169:Mycobacterium tuberculosis / Q000235:genetics*; D010802:Phylogeny; D011110:Polymorphism, Genetic; D012150:Polymorphism, Restriction Fragment Length; D012495:San Francisco / Q000453:epidemiology; D014376:Tuberculosis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000382:microbiology*; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology
D004269:DNA, Bacterial
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