UMR-MD3, Aix-Marseille Université, Institut de recherche Biomédicale des Armées, Marseille, France.
Malar J. 2012 Sep 4;11:307. doi: 10.1186/1475-2875-11-307.
Plasmodium ovale is one of the five malaria species infecting humans. Recent data have shown that the name of this neglected species masks two distinct genotypes also called curtisi and wallikeri. Some authors show that these species could be sympatric. These two subspecies are not differentiated by microscopy techniques and malaria rapid diagnostic tests. This diagnostic defect is the result of low parasitaemia, antigenic polymorphism and absence of antibodies performance and requires the use of sequencing techniques. An accurate and easy discrimination detection method is necessary.
A new molecular assay was developed to easily identify the two genotypes of P. ovale. This tool allowed the study of 90 blood samples containing P. ovale, confirmed by molecular biology techniques, which were obtained from patients with imported malaria.
The new marker was validated on well genotyped samples. The genotype of 90 P. ovale samples mainly imported from the Ivory Coast and the Comoros Islands was easily and quickly realized. The distribution of the two subspecies was described with a significant number of samples and showed that the two genotypes were present in the studied countries.
This work confirms the presence of the two species in the same country for the first time, in the Ivory Coast and the Comoros Islands. A better genotyping of P. ovale types may improve a better characterization of the clinical pathophysiology for each.
卵形疟原虫是感染人类的五种疟原虫之一。最近的数据表明，这个被忽视的物种的名称掩盖了两种不同的基因型，也称为 curtisi 和 wallikeri。一些作者表明，这些物种可能是同域的。这两个亚种不能通过显微镜技术和疟疾快速诊断测试来区分。这种诊断缺陷是由于低寄生虫血症、抗原多态性和缺乏抗体表现造成的，需要使用测序技术。因此，需要一种准确且易于区分的检测方法。
开发了一种新的分子检测方法，用于轻松识别卵形疟原虫的两种基因型。该工具允许对 90 份通过分子生物学技术确认的含有卵形疟原虫的血液样本进行研究，这些样本是从患有输入性疟疾的患者中获得的。
新标记物在经过良好基因分型的样本上得到了验证。90 份主要从科特迪瓦和科摩罗群岛进口的卵形疟原虫样本的基因型得到了快速准确的鉴定。对两个亚种的分布进行了描述，样本数量众多，表明在研究的国家中存在两种基因型。
这项工作首次证实了这两个物种在同一国家的存在，即科特迪瓦和科摩罗群岛。对卵形疟原虫类型的更好基因分型可能会改善对每种类型的临床病理生理学的更好特征描述。
