In Vitro and in Silico Study of Homologous Sequences in Leishmania Major

Leishmaniasis is a widely spread disease caused by protozoan parasites belonging to the genus Leishmania. The unique life cycle of this parasite has two main stages of existence, amastigote and promastigote. The non-infective amastigotes, found in the primary host (example: human) when taken up by certain species of sand fly (Phlebotomine) whilst ingesting the blood of the infected person, were transformed into promastigotes which is the infective form of the parasite and this process takes place in the mid-gut of the sandfly. One of specific proteins in the parasite’s genome in the transformation process, the adhesion protein gene was selected for this homology study. This In Silico approach to identify the homologous sequences in Leishmania major was to understand the evolutionary relationship among species, both in structural and functional aspects. The adhesion protein gene, which is responsible for the adhesion of the parasite in promastigote stage on to the midgut wall of the insect vector, was selected for the purpose of primer design. The DNA from the leishmania major culture was extracted and the designed primers were used against it in PCR. The product was purified from the gel and the PCR product was sequenced. The sequenced data was found to have homology with Leishmania major genome and the confirmations are produced.