prevalence of tt virus in general population of isfahan .

introduction: tt virus (ttv) is an unenveloped single-stranded circular dna virus. sensitive pcr (polymerase chain reaction) methods with primers designed for very conserved regions of the viral genome (utr) indicate high prevalence (> 90%) of ttv infection in general population of many countries world-wide. although there has been no evidence of its relation to any liver or other specific disease to date, it is speculated that certain genotype(s) may be capable of causing hepatitis. a relationship between viral load and immune status of host is also suggested. this study was done to determine the prevalence of ttv infection in general population of isfahan, iran. methods : serum samples were collected from 132 voluntary blood donors in blood transfusion organization, isfahan. among them, four were positive for hbs-ag and six for anti-hcv antibody. dna was extracted and subjected to pcr using consensus primers. the amplified pcr products were sequenced. results: ttv dna was detected in 105 out of 132 examined samples (95% confidence interval: 73% to 86% with) these included ninety-five out of 122 healthy and 10 out of 10 hepatitis-positive sera. conclusion: the results showed high prevalence of ttv in general population of isfahan which is the same as other areas studied. determining the genotypes present in isfahan population is suggested .   hakim research journal 2007 9(4): 52- 58.