Typing of Thai clinical isolates of Mycobacterium leprae and analysis of leprosy transmission by polymorphism of tandem repeats.

ABSTRACT

Mycobacterium leprae isolates from Thai leprosy patients were typed for strain differentiation and analysis of leprosy transmission using the six base tandem repeat, GACATC, in rpoT gene and TTC repeat as genetic markers. M. leprae DNA was isolated from skin biopsies of new untreated leprosy patients living in remote areas or in suburban regions of Thailand where leprosy is in low prevalence. In M. leprae strains of 100 patients, TTC alleles exhibited variations in length with 10 to 30, 33 and 35 repeats, the most common alleles being 15, 16, 17 and 19 repeats. All isolates contained three copies of the six base repeat in rpoT gene. Application of TTC repeats in tracking leprosy transmission in two families with multi-cases identified a single (but different) strain of M. leprae in each family.