Strongyloides

Thamsborg, S.M., Ketzis, J., Horii, Y., Matthews, J.B. 2017. Strongyloides spp. infections of veterinary importance

• There are several common species of Strongyloides which infect different host. S. stercoralis is the best studied because it infects humans and can also infect cats, dogs, and non-human primates. S. papillosus infects cattle, sheep, goats, rabbits, and small ruminants. This species is widespread with cases identified in South America, Europe, Africa, and Asia. S. ransomi is another agriculturally relevant species that infects pigs. Infections of S. ransomi have been seen in Europe.

Kramme S, Nissen N, Soblik H, Erttmann K, Tannich E, Fleischer B, Panning M, Brattig N. J. 2011. Novel real-time PCR for the universal detection of Strongyloides species.

• A real-time PCR strategy was developed to detect the Strongyloides 28S rRNA gene introduced to mice via plasmid in E. coli. This gene is thought to be well conserved across all Strongyloides species. Targeting the 28S rRNA gene was useful for the detection of S. stercoralis and S. ratti. There was no cross-reactivity to any of the common non-Strongyloides infections tested. Genomic data suggests that this target could allow detection of other Strongyloides species but this could not be confirmed due to limitations of the study. The authors hypothesize that this detection method can be used for all Strongyloides species.