Evaluation of the 15 and 24-loci MIRU-VNTR genotyping tools with spoligotyping in the identification of Mycobacterium tuberculosis strains and their genetic diversity in molecular epidemiology studies

AbstractBackground: The transmission dynamics of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) using various genotyping tools has been studied globally and a particular tool for genotyping Mtb is the mycobacterial interspersed repetitive units-variable number tandem repeats (MIRU-VNTR). Tuberculosis (TB) remains an important public health problem worldwide and Sri Lanka being a country of tourist destination; because of major development projects undergoing, it has a high proportion of tourists and immigrants from Asia and Europe that are characterized with highest TB incidences and drug-resistant clinical isolates. Hence, in order to address the question of Mtb genetic diversity, we investigated the discriminatory power of both MIRU-VNTR typing of 15 and 24 loci with spoligotyping to differentiate Mtb isolates.Method: Acid-fast bacilli positive sputum samples (n = 150) from first visit patients were collected. Decontamination of sputum and extraction of genomic DNA were carried out using standard techniques. The isol...