Leishmaniasis is endemic ofIraq in both cutaneous and visceral form. The available tools for diagnosis and detection of Leishmaniaare nonspecific and may interfere with other species. In this study, Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) has been used to identify Iraqi isolate of visceral leishmaniasis (MHOM/ IQ/2005/MRU15) which a previously diagnosed by classical serological tests. PCR amplificationwas carried out using species-specific primers of Leishmania donovani. Four primer pairs of mini-circle DNA and ITS-1 were used.13A/13B, which is used to identify Leishmaniaas a genus, NM12, LITSR/L5.8S and BHUL18S, were used to detect the sub species of L. donovani.The result ofPCR amplification of 13A/13BkDNA revealed that a band of ~ 120 bp. NM12, LITSR/L5.8Sand BHUL18S primer pairs demonstrated bands of 204 bp, 320 bpand 311 bp, respectively. Theresultsof this study arerecommended to be used foridentification ofvisceral leishmaniasis identification instead of time consuming and non-specific classical methods.
University of Baghdad
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