Molecular epidemiological study of invasive pulmonary aspergillosis in a renal transplantation unit.

The molecular epidemiology of an outbreak of invasive pulmonary aspergillosis which occurred on a renal transplantation unit was investigated. Restriction fragment length polymorphism and random amplified polymorphic DNA analyses were used to characterise the isolates of Aspergillus fumigatus from the patients (2 isolates from each of 2 patients) and from the environment (11 isolates). While the isolates from the environment could be readily distinguished from each other by both methods, each patient appeared to be infected with a single strain. These findings lend support to the suggestion that certain isolates of Aspergillus fumigatus are more pathogenic than others.