Acta Tropica 117 (2011) 39–46
Molecular identification and phylogenetic analysis of Trypanosoma evansi from
dromedary camels (Camelus dromedarius) in Egypt, a pilot study
Said Amera,b, Oishi Ryua, Chika Tadaa, Yasuhiro Fukudaa, Noboru Inouec, Yutaka
Nakaia,∗
a Laboratory of Sustainable Environmental Biology, Field Centre studies, Graduate School of
Agricultural Science,
Tohoku University, 232-3 Yomogida, Naruko-Onsen, Osaki, Miyagi 989-6711, Japan
b Department of Zoology, Faculty of Science, Kafr El Sheikh University, Kafr El Sheikh
33516, Egypt
c National Research Center for Protozoan Diseases, Obihiro University of Agriculture and
Veterinary Medicine, Obihiro, Hokkaido 080-8555, Japan
abstract
Animal trypanosomiasis is one of the major constraints of livestock industry in
developing countries. In the present study, prevalence of Trypanosome evansi was
assessed in the blood of dromedary camels (Camelus dromedarius) brought to Al
Bassatein abattoir, Cairo, Egypt, by mouse inoculation test out of 84 tested camels, 4
animals (4.7%) were infected. Molecular analysis was achieved by PCR amplification
and sequence analysis of part of ribosomal RNA gene including 18S, ITS1, 5.8S and
ITS2 regions. Despite the conserved nature of 18S region, ITS region showed obvious
heterogeneity compared to analogous sequences in database. Analysis of transferrin
receptor encoding gene (ESAG6) showed variable repertoire in the studied isolates,
which may indicate to a novel structure of T. evansi population from Egypt and/or
a difference in host range. Furthermore, analysis of variable surface glycoprotein
RoTat 1.2 gene marker revealed some heterogeneity at this gene locus. To our
knowledge, this is the first molecular analysis of T. evansi in Egypt.