An examination of the two Leptospira interrogans genomes sequenced so far reveals few genetic differences, including an extra DNA region, 54 kb in length, in L. interrogans serovar Lai. This locus contains 103 predicted coding sequences that are absent from the genome of L. interrogans serovar Copenhageni, of which only 20% had significant BLASTP hits in GenBank. By analyzing the L. interrogans...

Recurrent uveitis as a sequela to Leptospira infection is the most common infectious cause of blindness and impaired vision of horses worldwide. Leptospiral proteins expressed during prolonged survival in the eyes of horses with lesions of chronic uveitis were identified by screening a phage library of Leptospira interrogans DNA fragments with eye fluids from uveitic horses. Inserts of reactive...

OBJECTIVE To detect leptospiral antibodies by microscopic agglutination test (MAT) in north-east of Iran. METHODS This study was conducted to evaluate prevalence of human leptospiral infections by MAT, using six current reference strains of Leptospira interrogans in north-east of Iran. A total of 285 serum samples were collected from three north-east provinces of Iran, from December, 2009 to ...

Leptospira interrogans is a bacterium that is capable of infecting animals and humans, and its infection causes leptospirosis with a range of symptoms from flu-like to severe illness and death. Despite being a bacteria, Leptospira interrogans contains a plastidic class ferredoxin-NADP(H) reductase (FNR) with high catalytic efficiency, at difference from the bacterial class FNRs. These flavoenzy...

Leptospira are emerging zoonotic pathogens transmitted from animals to humans typically through contaminated environmental sources of water and soil. Regulatory pathways of pathogenic Leptospira spp. underlying the adaptive response to different hosts and environmental conditions remains elusive. In this study, we provide the first global Transcriptional Start Site (TSS) map of a Leptospira spe...

Transmission of pathogenic Leptospira between mammalian hosts usually involves dissemination via soil or water contaminated by the urine of carrier animals. The ability of Leptospira to adapt to the diverse conditions found inside and outside the host is reflected in its relatively large genome size and high percentage of signal transduction genes. An exception is Leptospira borgpetersenii sero...

Leptospirosis is a worldwide deadly zoonotic disease. Accurate identification of the causative Leptospira spp. spirochetes ascertains the pathogenic status of the isolates, identifies potential source of infection and recognises outbreaks. Species identification is currently based on technically demanding, time and resources consuming serological and molecular methods. Matrix-assisted laser des...

In this study, 191 culture isolates were recovered from suspected samples of animals and humans in Ellinghausen McCullough Johnson and Harris (EMJH) medium and assessed for its morphological features by dark field microscopy. Extracted DNA from individual culture was subjected to different PCR assays for identification and characterization of leptospira. Out of 99 positive leptospira cultures, ...

The prevalence of Leptospira interrogans serovars in dairy cattle was determined by analyzing 464 serum samples from cows on 15 properties in Garanhuns municipal district, Pernambuco State, Brazil. A microscopic seroagglutination test including 12 serovars of Leptospira interrogans as antigens was used. Samples with titres 100 were considered positive. Two hundred and twenty-one (47.63%) of the...

In China, Leptospira interrogans serovar Lai strain 56601 (str.56601) is one of main pathogenic strains that cause severe leptospirosis in both human and animals. The genome of this organism was completely sequenced in 2003. However, in 2011, we identified and corrected some assembly errors in the str.56601 genome due to the repeat sequences widely distributed in the Leptospira genome. In this ...