ABSTRACT
Pattern-recognition receptors (PRRs) play a key role in innate immunity against intracellular bacteria. NOD2 is one of the PRRs that contribute to the immune response to Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection. We sequenced coding regions of the NOD2 gene in 377 African Americans with tuberculosis (TB) disease and 187 ethnically matched control subjects. Three common nonsynonymous single-nucleotide polymorphisms--Pro268Ser, Arg702Trp, and Ala725Gly--demonstrated significant associations with TB disease. This finding may contribute to the future development of immunotherapy and immunoprophylaxis for TB disease.
Subject(s)
Black or African American/genetics , Genetic Predisposition to Disease , Nod2 Signaling Adaptor Protein/genetics , Polymorphism, Genetic , Tuberculosis, Pulmonary/genetics , Adult , Female , Humans , Male , Middle AgedABSTRACT
Validation of the MycoAlign assay, a newly developed Mycobacterium spp. identification system based on internal transcribed spacer-1 sequencing, was performed using 50 acid-fast bacilli (AFB)-positive clinical laboratory specimens. Forty-three (86%) diagnostic-level results were obtained, including 38 Mycobacterium spp. and 5 other AFB-positive genera. Three isolates (6%) had suboptimal identity scores with high probability (81-87% identity score). Four (8%) mixed-pattern results were obtained. Forty-five (90%) observations were concordant with the species identification by standard methods, including all controls.
