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. 2002 May;40(5):1862-5.
doi: 10.1128/JCM.40.5.1862-1865.2002.

Pneumocystis carinii f. sp. hominis is not infectious for SCID mice

Isabelle Durand-Joly  1 , El Moukhtar Aliouat, Céline Recourt, Karine Guyot, Nadine François, Michèle Wauquier, Daniel Camus, Eduardo Dei-Cas
Affiliations

Pneumocystis carinii f. sp. hominis is not infectious for SCID mice

Isabelle Durand-Joly et al. J Clin Microbiol. 2002 May.

Abstract

The infectious power of Pneumocystis carinii f. sp. hominis was explored by inoculating SCID mice intranasally with either P. carinii f. sp. hominis or P. carinii f. sp. muris isolates. Only mice inoculated with mouse parasites developed Pneumocystis pneumonia, as assessed by microscopy and PCR. These results suggest that humans do not contract pneumocystosis from animals.

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Figures

FIG. 1.
FIG. 1.
In vivo and in vitro P. carinii f. sp. hominis organisms. (a and b) Parasites in a fresh bronchoalveolar lavage fluid sample stained with ortho-toluidine blue (a) or methanol-Giemsa (b) stains. (c and d) Clustered vegetative and cystic forms attached to L2 epithelial alveolar cells in short-term culture after 24 h (c) or 48 h (d). Arrows, Pneumocystis cysts containing well-visible intracystic bodies; arrowheads, trophozoites. Bar, 10 μm.
FIG. 2.
FIG. 2.
Hybridization of amplified DNA with the digoxigenin-labeled 24-bp specific probe for P. carinii f. sp. muris (IPL-M) (top) and P. carinii f. sp. hominis (IPL-H) (bottom), defined in the mitochondrial gene encoding the large subunit rRNA. Lanes 1 to 3, control SCID mice (group 8); lanes 4 to 9, mice inoculated with P. carinii f. sp. hominis; lane 10, PCR negative control (with no added DNA); lane 11, DNA ladder; lanes 12 and 13, mice inoculated with P. carinii f. sp. muris; lane 14, P. carinii f. sp. muris organisms used as inoculum for mice from groups 6 and 7; lane 15, positive DNA control of P. carinii f. sp. hominis. The arrow indicates the size (350 bp) of the specific amplified product.
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References

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