Weiss L M, Vossbrinck C R
Department of Pathology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, NY 10461, USA.
Adv Parasitol. 1998;40:351-95. doi: 10.1016/s0065-308x(08)60127-x.
The term 'microsporidia' is a nontaxonomic designation which is used to refer to a group of intracellular parasites belonging to the phylum Microspora. These eukaryotic obligate intracellular protozoans have been described infecting every major animal group, especially insects, fish and mammals. They are important agricultural parasites in commercially important insects, fish, laboratory rodents, rabbits, fur-bearing animals, and primates. There is now an increasing recognition of microsporidia as important opportunistic pathogens in persons infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Microsporidia possess ribosomes with features resembling prokaryotes. Phylogenetic analysis of the rRNA sequence from several of the microsporidia suggests that these organisms were early branches in the eukaryotic evolutionary line. The data on these molecular phylogenetic relationships are reviewed in this paper. Inroads have recently been made into the molecular biology of these organisms and these data are also presented. Diagnosis of microsporidia infection from stool examination is possible and has replaced biopsy as the initial diagnostic procedure in many laboratories. These staining techniques can be difficult, however, due to the small size of the spores. The specific identification of microsporidian species has classically depended on ultrastructural examination. With the cloning of the rRNA genes from the human pathogenic microsporidia it has been possible to apply polymerase chain reaction (PCR) techniques for the diagnosis of microsporidial infection at the species level. Both staining and PCR techniques for the diagnosis of microsporidia are reviewed.
“微孢子虫”一词是一个非分类学名称，用于指代属于微孢子虫门的一组细胞内寄生虫。这些真核专性细胞内原生动物已被描述为感染每一个主要动物类群，尤其是昆虫、鱼类和哺乳动物。它们是商业上重要昆虫、鱼类、实验啮齿动物、兔子、毛皮动物和灵长类动物中的重要农业寄生虫。现在，人们越来越认识到微孢子虫是感染人类免疫缺陷病毒（HIV）的人群中的重要机会性病原体。微孢子虫拥有具有类似原核生物特征的核糖体。对几种微孢子虫的rRNA序列进行的系统发育分析表明，这些生物是真核进化谱系中的早期分支。本文对这些分子系统发育关系的数据进行了综述。最近在这些生物的分子生物学方面取得了进展，这些数据也将呈现。通过粪便检查诊断微孢子虫感染是可行的，并且在许多实验室中已取代活检作为初始诊断程序。然而，由于孢子体积小，这些染色技术可能会很困难。微孢子虫物种的特异性鉴定传统上依赖于超微结构检查。随着从人类致病微孢子虫中克隆出rRNA基因，已经能够应用聚合酶链反应（PCR）技术在物种水平上诊断微孢子虫感染。本文对微孢子虫诊断的染色和PCR技术都进行了综述。
