title: Continuous in vivo culture and indirect fluorescent antibody test for zoonotic protozoa of Babesia microti.
abstract: Babesiosis has attracted attention as a zoonotic disease. The disease is caused in immunocompetent individuals almost solely by Babesia microti, a rodent babesia. Most cases of human babesiosis by B. microti have been reported in the endemic foci of the Northeastern coastal areas and upper Midwest regions of the United States, while some sporadic cases have recently been reported in several Asian countries including Japan. Our previous surveys identified that four small subunit ribosomal RNA gene (SSUrDNA) types of B. microti parasitize Japanese rodents. Indirect fluorescent antibody test (IFAT) is often performed for the diagnosis of babesiosis together with microscopical examination of thin blood smears and PCR. We established IFAT against four SSUrDNA-types of B. microti using erythrocytes of SCID mice or Syrian hamsters infected with each SSUrDNA-type B. microti. The results of IFAT for sera of ICR mice or Syrian hamsters infected with each SSUrDNA-type B. microti demonstrated that the four SSUrDNA-types of B. microti have different serotypes. Here, we report technical or practical procedures of IFAT, which gains sufficiently stable results, including procedures of continuous in vivo culture of B. microti.
authors.affiliation: Section of Microbiology, Department of Pharmacy, School of Pharmacy, Hyogo University of Health Sciences, Kobe, Hyogo 650-8530, Japan; Section of Parasitology, Department of Microbiology and Infectious Diseases, Kobe University Graduate School of Medicine, Kobe, Hyogo 650-0017, Japan. Electronic address: atsuko@huhs.ac.jp.
authors.forename: Atsuko
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Saito-Ito
authors.affiliation: Section of Microbiology, Department of Pharmacy, School of Pharmacy, Hyogo University of Health Sciences, Kobe, Hyogo 650-8530, Japan.
authors.forename: Atsuko
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kawai
authors.affiliation: Section of Microbiology, Department of Pharmacy, School of Pharmacy, Hyogo University of Health Sciences, Kobe, Hyogo 650-8530, Japan.
authors.forename: Shiho
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ohmori
authors.affiliation: Section of Microbiology, Department of Pharmacy, School of Pharmacy, Hyogo University of Health Sciences, Kobe, Hyogo 650-8530, Japan.
authors.forename: Motoko
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Nagano-Fujii
keywords: Babesia microti; Babesiosis; Genotype; Indirect fluorescent antibody test; Protozoa; Zoonosis