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Fifteen Years after the Definition of Trypanosoma cruzi DTUs: What Have We Learned?
Version 1
: Received: 5 November 2023 / Approved: 6 November 2023 / Online: 7 November 2023 (11:40:14 CET)
A peer-reviewed article of this Preprint also exists.
Zingales, B.; Macedo, A.M. Fifteen Years after the Definition of Trypanosoma cruzi DTUs: What Have We Learned? Life 2023, 13, 2339. Zingales, B.; Macedo, A.M. Fifteen Years after the Definition of Trypanosoma cruzi DTUs: What Have We Learned? Life 2023, 13, 2339.
Abstract
Trypanosoma cruzi, the protozoan causative of Chagas disease (ChD), exhibits striking genetic and phenotypic intraspecific diversity, along with ecoepidemiological complexity. Human-pathogen interactions lead to distinct clinical presentations of ChD. In 2009, an international consensus classified T. cruzi strains into six discrete typing units (DTUs), TcI to TcVI, later including TcBat, and proposed reproducible genotyping schemes for DTU identification. This article aims to review the impact of classifying T. cruzi strains into DTUs on our understanding of biological, ecoepidemio-logical, and pathogenic aspects of T. cruzi. We will explore the likely origin of DTUs and the intrinsic characteristics of each group of strains concerning genome organization, genomics, and suscepti-bility to drugs used in ChD treatment. We will also provide an overview of the association of DTUs with mammalian reservoirs, and summarize the geographic distribution, and the clinical implica-tions, of prevalent specific DTUs in ChD patients. Throughout this review, we will emphasize the crucial roles of both parasite and human genetics in defining ChD pathogenesis and chemotherapy outcome.
Keywords
Trypanosoma cruzi; Discrete Typing Units; genomics; Chagas disease manifestations; ecoepidemiology
Subject
Biology and Life Sciences, Other
Copyright: This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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