Role of placental barrier integrity in infection by Trypanosoma cruzi.

Role of placental barrier integrity in infection by Trypanosoma cruzi. Acta Trop. 2016 Sep 26; Authors: Díaz-Luján C, Triquell MF, Castillo C, Hardisson D, Kemmerling U, Fretes RE Abstract American trypanosomiasis has long been a neglected disease endemic in LatinAmerica, but congenital transmission has now spread Chagas disease to cause a global health problem. As the early stages of the infection of placental tissue and the vertical transmission by Trypanosoma cruzi are still not well understood, it is important to investigate the relevance of the first structure of the placental barrier in chorionic villi infection by T. cruzi during the initial stage of the infection. Explants of human chorionic villi from healthy pregnant women at term were denuded of their syncytiotrophoblast and co-cultured for 3h, 24h and 96h with 800,000 trypomastigotes (simulating acute infection). T. cruzi infected cells were identified by immunohistochemistry for cytokeratin-7 (+cytotrophoblast) and CD68 (+macrophages), and the infection was quantified. In placental tissue, the parasite load was analyzed by qPCR and microscopy, and the motile trypomastigotes were quantified in culture supernatant. In denuded chorionic villous, the total area occupied by the parasite (451.23μm(2), 1.33%) and parasite load (RQ: 87) was significantly higher (p<0.05) than in the entire villous (control) (5.98μm(2), 0.016%) (RQ:1) and with smaller concentration of nitri...
Source: Acta Tropica - Category: Infectious Diseases Authors: Tags: Acta Trop Source Type: research