For First Time, Organism Responsible For Buruli Ulcer Isolated And Characterized

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Main Category: Infectious Diseases / Bacteria / Viruses
Also Included In: Public Health;  Tropical Diseases;  Biology / Biochemistry
Article Date: 27 Mar 2008 - 0:00 PDT

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The organism that causes Buruli ulcer (BU) has, for the first time, been isolated and characterized, according to an article published on March 26, 2008 in PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases.

Buruli ulcer is a neglected disease that necrotizes flesh and sometimes produces enormous, disfiguring ulcers that have a high social impact on the victim. It was previously postulated that the responsible agent is the Mycobacterium ulcerans, and that transmission to humans occurs in aquatic areas. However, the method of transmission has not actually been characterized, and the organism has never been isolated in pure culture before from any environmental sources.

The Buruli ulcer often presents itself in children in the humid, tropical, and impoverished regions of rural Africa, but can affect many different types of populations. Incidence has been steadily increasing, and it now affects more people in certain regions than tuberculosis and leprosy, two other diseases which have been shown to be caused by mycobacteria. It is a disease that reinforces poverty, and is chronically infectious.

In this study, M. ulcerans was isolated from the environment and characterized by Françoise Portaels (Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerpen, Belgium) and colleagues in Ghana, Portugal, and the US. To the best of their knowledge, this is the first time that this task has been successfully performed, and they provide the details in the given article.

To isolate the bacterium, the team collected several aquatic specimens that were targeted for the study of mycobacteria in BU endemic regions in Benin and Togo. In vitro cultures were established and analyzed using PCR and by inoculating the organism in mice.

The resulting isolated strain has features similar to the microbiological characteristics of African strains of Mycobacterium ulcerans, and was found in an aquatic insect called the Water Strider. Further analysis lends support to the idea that the organism is transmitted to humans from aquatic niches and not directly from person to person. "Our findings support the concept that Mycobacterium ulcerans is a pathogen of humans with an aquatic environmental niche," state the authors. They further indicate that this result "will have positive consequences for the control of this neglected and socially important tropical disease."

Tim Stinear (Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, Australia) and Paul Johnson (Austin Hospital, Heidelberg, Australia), who were not involved in the study, contributed an Expert Commentary in the same issue of PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases. They reinforce that this new study is a true breakthrough in the study of this debilitating disease.  "[It is a] a major achievement and will serve as the definitive reference point for scientists' intent on revealing the ecology, environmental reservoir, and precise mode of transmission of Mycobacterium ulcerans.

About PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases

PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases (http://www.plosntds.org/) is a peer-reviewed, open-access journal devoted to the pathology, epidemiology, prevention, treatment, and control of the neglected tropical diseases, as well as public policy relevant to this group of diseases. All works published in PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases are open access, which means that everything is immediately and freely available subject only to the condition that the original authorship and source are properly attributed. The Public Library of Science uses the Creative Commons Attribution License, and copyright is retained by the authors.

About the Public Library of Science

The Public Library of Science (PLoS) is a non-profit organization of scientists and physicians committed to making the world's scientific and medical literature a freely available public resource. For more information, visit http://www.plos.org.

First Cultivation and Characterization of Mycobacterium ulcerans from the Environment.
Portaels F, Meyers WM, Ablordey A, Castro AG, Chemlal K, et al.
PLoS Negl Trop Dis 2(3): e178.
doi:10.1371/journal.pntd.0000178
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First Isolation of Mycobacterium ulcerans from an Aquatic Environment: The End of a 60-Year Search?
Stinear T, Johnson PDR
PLoS Negl Trop Dis 2(3): e216.
doi:10.1371/journal.pntd.0000216
Click Here For Full Length

Written by Anna Sophia McKenney
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