The genus Mycobacterium comprises significant pathogenic species that infect both humans and animals. One species within this genus, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, is the primary killer of humans resulting from bacterial infections. Five mycobacterial genomes belonging to four different species (M. tuberculosis, Mycobacterium bovis, Mycobacterium leprae and Mycobacterium avium ssp. paratuberculosi...

Abstract The treatment of leprosy is long and complex, benefiting from the development sterilizing, rapidly-acting drugs. Reductive evolution made Mycobacterium leprae exquisitely sensitive to Telacebec, a phase 2 drug candidate for tuberculosis. unprecedented potency Telacebec against M. warrants further validation in clinical trials.

The causative agent of leprosy is Mycobacterium leprae (M. leprae), which establishes infectious lesions in the skin. Leprosy is classified based on the clinical manifestation, the host’s immune response and skin symptoms. M. leprae is an intracellular pathogen that invades keratinocytes, macrophages, dendritic cells and Schwann cells and replicates within these cells. M. leprae-infected kerati...

The ability of the 45-kDa serine-rich Mycobacterium leprae antigen to stimulate peripheral blood mononuclear cell (PBMC) proliferation and gamma interferon (IFN-gamma) production was measured in leprosy patients, household contacts, and healthy controls from areas of endemicity in Mexico. Almost all the tuberculoid leprosy patients gave strong PBMC proliferation responses to the M. leprae 45-kD...

Leprosy is caused by the bacterial pathogens Mycobacterium leprae and Mycobacterium lepromatosis. Apart from humans, animals such as nine-banded armadillos in the Americas and red squirrels in the British Isles are naturally infected with M. leprae. Natural leprosy has also been reported in certain nonhuman primates, but it is not known whether these occurrences are due to incidental infections...

This study was performed in order to analyse whether the immune unresponsiveness to Mycobacterium leprae, largely seen in lepromatous patients, persisted after discharge from treatment. Lymphoproliferation and skin tests were performed using two mycobacterial antigens (M. leprae and BCG) in three groups of lepromatous patients grouped by treatment status. Forty-seven per cent of the lepromatous...

Mycobacterium leprae, despite being recognized as a human pathogen over 140 years ago, remains uncultivable in microbiological culture media or in cell culture systems. Although it is now well established that M. leprae prefers cooler temperatures, slightly acidic microaerophilic conditions, and lipids rather than sugars as an energy source, the exact parameters for a defined axenic medium that...

Shepard, Charles C. (Communicable Disease Center, Atlanta, Ga.). Temperature optimum of Mycobacterium leprae in mice. J. Bacteriol. 90:1271-1275. 1965.-Mycobacterium leprae multiplied most rapidly in foot pads of mice kept at an air temperature of 20 C. At air temperatures of 15 and 25 C, bacillary multiplication was slightly slower; at 10 and 30 C, distinctly slower; and at 4 and 35 C, no baci...

Mice chronically infected with the intracellular protozoan Toxoplasma gondii or Besnoitia jellisoni were resistant to footpad challenge with Mycobacterium leprae. Resistance was manifested by lower numbers of recoverable M. leprae in the footpads of protozoal-infected mice and was enhanced in Toxoplasma-infected mice by a booster injection of Toxoplasma antigen in the infected footpad. The resu...

Leprosy is a chronic infectious disease caused by Mycobacterium leprae (M. leprae) that involves the integumentary and peripheral nervous system, causing neuropathy, deformity, disability. Early detection appropriate treatment are ways to break chain of transmission prevent disability in leprosy patients. The first line for standard Multidrug Therapy (MDT) regiment consisting rifampicin, dapson...