Evaluation and comparison of the sensitivity of the primers that amplify the msp2 and msp5 genes of anaplasma marginale for the diagnosis of bovine anaplasmosis

Abstract

The bacterium A. marginale infects the erythrocytes in bovines, causing an anemic picture that affects the animal’s productivity, being necessary the application of sensitive and specific diagnostic me thods for the control and treatment of the disease. In this sense, molecular techniques have become an ideal tool for diagnosis, therefore, taking into account that in Venezuela the PCR technique has been developed using the primers 19A and 19B that amplify the msp5 gene of the bacterium and The recent design of the primers msp2A and msp2B, which amplify the msp2 gene, aimed to evaluate the sensitivity of both pairs of primers, as well as their potential for molecular diagnosis.For this, an assay was carried out from serial dilutions of a sample of positive reference quantified DNA A. marginale in a population of 22 animals, using the PCR technique, using in both cases the primers 19A / B and msp2A / B, for comparative purposes. The results obtained showed that the sensitivity of the primers that amplify the msp2 and msp5 genes was 0.01ng / gl, being similar but not identical, since the intensity of the bands was greater using the primers that amplified the msp5 gene. This fact was evidenced when evaluating the bovine population, where when using the primers msp2A / B and 19A / 19B, a prevalence of 13.63% and 68.18% respectively was obtained, concluding that the primers 19A / B are better for the Diagnosis of A. marginale in bovine field samples.