Volume 12, Number 5—May 2006
Dispatch
Heterogeneity among Mycobacterium ulcerans Isolates from Africa
Pieter Stragier*, Anthony Ablordey*, L. Manou Bayonne†, Yatta L. Lugor‡, Ireneaus S. Sindani§, Patrick Suykerbuyk*, Henry Wabinga¶, Wayne M. Meyers#, and Françoise Portaels*
Table 1
MIRU-VNTR profiles of Mycobacterium ulcerans and origin of specimens (BK no.) or culture isolates*
| ITM no./loci† | 1‡ | 6‡ | 9‡ | 33‡ | Genotype | Origin | Ziehl-Neelsen staining§ | Year¶ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5142 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | Victoria | Victoria, Australia | 1967 | |
| 9540 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Southeast Asia | Queensland, Australia; PNG; Malaysia | 1978 | |
| 98-0912, 8756 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 | Asia | China, Japan | 1998 | |
| BK03-0621 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 3 | PNGII | PNG | 3+ | 2003 |
| BK02-2487 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | PNGIII | PNG | 1+ | 2002 |
| BK04-0296 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | PNG | 1+ | 2004 | |
| 842 | NA | 1 | 2 | 1 | Suriname | Suriname | 1984 | |
| 7922 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | French Guiana | French Guiana | 1990 | |
| 5114 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | Mexico | Mexico | 1953 | |
| 5116 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | Central African Congo River Basin | Maniema, DRC | 1962 | |
| 9099 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | Maniema, DRC | 1964 | ||
| 5150 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Atlantic Africa | Bas-Congo, DRC | 1962 | |
| 94-0662 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Côte d'Ivoire | 1994 | ||
| 96-0658 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Angola | 1996 | ||
| 97-0483 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Ghana | 1997 | ||
| BK04-0875 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Togo | 4+ | 2004 | |
| BK04-1396 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Benin | – | 2004 | |
| 02-0280 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Cameroon | 2002 | ||
| 02-1081 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Cameroon | 2002 | ||
| 05-0303 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Congo-Brazzaville | 1979 | ||
| 05-0304 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Congo-Brazzaville | 1979 | ||
| BK05-0027 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | Gabon | 1+ | 2005 | |
| BK04-1591 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | East African Nile River Basin | Sudan | 4+ | 2004 |
| BK04-1601 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | Sudan | – | 2004 | |
| 05-0861 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | Orientale, DRC | 1959 | ||
| 05-1459 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | Uganda (NCTC no. 10445) | 1964 | ||
| BK04-0513 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | Uganda | 1+ | 2004 | |
| BK05-0614 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | Uganda | 4+ | 2005 |
*MIRU, mycobacterial interspersed repetitive unit; VNTR, variable-number tandem repeat; PNG, Papua New Guinea; DRC, Democratic Republic of Congo; NA, no amplification; NCTC, National Collection of Type Cultures. Shaded fields represent results from our previous study (6).
†ITM numbers (Institute of Tropical Medicine). These numbers are representative members for the genotype each belongs to (6).
‡Numbers in columns 2 through 5 represent the number of repeats at the specific locus. These numbers form a pattern that divides M. ulcerans into genotypes.
§Scale of the American Thoracic Society. Ziehl-Neelsen staining has not been done on culture isolates, since identifying acid-fast bacilli in a culture is an obsolete practice.
¶The date represents the year of isolation.
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