Diversity of ribosomal DNA fingerprints of Leptospira serovars provides a database for subtyping and species assignation.

Ribosomal DNA fingerprints from 103 pathogenic Leptospira strains were examined using EcoRI restriction and fragment length polymorphisms of rRNA genes. Sixty-nine new leptospiral ribotypes were described, in addition to 49 previously observed. Except for 5 strains, a good correlation between DNA homology data and ribotyping was observed. The genospecies of 31 reference strains could be presumed, since they shared 13 ribotypes with strain(s) previously studied by DNA homology. Furthermore, the definition of common rRNA hybridization fragments in each recognized DNA hybridization group provides information about the status of Leptospira reference strains yet to be classified. With 118 ribotypes now defined among the validated serovar reference strains, rRNA fingerprints constitute a database for subtyping Leptospira species.