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Surface fine topography and PCR-based determination of metacercaria of Paragonimus sp. from edible crabs in Arunachal Pradesh, Northeast India

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Abstract

In several mountainous regions of Northeastern India, foci of Paragonimus infection reportedly involving species that are known to prevail in China have been identified. The present study was undertaken to demonstrate the surface fine topography and sequence analysis of the ribosomal deoxyribonucleic acid (rDNA; second internal transcribed spacer, ITS2) of the metacercarial stages of the lung fluke collected from a mountain stream of the area (Miao, Changlang District in Arunachal Pradesh). The encysted metacercariae were oval in shape and had a smooth surface. The newly excysted metacercaria had a ventral sucker larger than the oral; the body surface was covered with numerous single-pointed and thorn-like tegumentary spines, of which those on the anterior part of the body were bigger in size and showed a gradual reduction in length and number towards the posterior end; dome-shaped papillae in variable numbers were seen around the rim of the oral sucker and were sparsely distributed all over the body surface. The polymerase chain reaction-amplified rDNA ITS2 sequences of the metacercariae were aligned with known sequences for the various species of Paragonimus, and the expectation value was found to be most significant with P. westermani, revealing an absolute match. The surface topography including the number and distribution of papillae and spination patterns and the ITS2 sequences of the metacercariae strongly suggest that the Paragonimus species, prevalent in the region of India, is in fact P. westermani.

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Acknowledgements

This study was carried out under the ‘All India Co-ordinated Project on Capacity Building in Taxonomy: Research on Helminths,’ sanctioned to VT by Ministry of Environment and Forests, GOI; DBT Project to VT and AC and DSA programme of the University Grants Commission, GOI, in the Department of Zoology, NEHU, Shillong. We thank the co-ordinator, Bioinformatics Centre, NEHU, for allowing access to its facility.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Zoology, North-Eastern Hill University, Shillong, 793022, Meghalaya, India

    V. Tandon & P. K. Prasad

  2. Department of Biotechnology and Bioinformatics, North-Eastern Hill University, Shillong, 793022, Meghalaya, India

    A. Chatterjee

  3. Field Station, Zoological Survey of India, Itanagar, 791113, Arunachal Pradesh, India

    P. T. Bhutia

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  1. V. Tandon
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Correspondence to V. Tandon.

Additional information

The nucleotide sequence data reported in this paper have been submitted to the Genbank data with the accession number DQ351845.

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Tandon, V., Prasad, P.K., Chatterjee, A. et al. Surface fine topography and PCR-based determination of metacercaria of Paragonimus sp. from edible crabs in Arunachal Pradesh, Northeast India. Parasitol Res 102, 21–28 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00436-007-0715-4

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