The Development and Use of Repetitive Sequences as DNA Probes for Parasite Detection and Species Identification

The use of DNA probes for the detection and identification of para sites has become a routine practice in many laboratories and the tech nique is rapidly becoming established as a diagnostic tool for field and clinical studies. DNA probes have been used in the identification of a large number of parasites including Leishmania (1 –4 ), malaria parasites (5 –8 ), trypanosomes (9 –10 ), Onchocerca (11 –13 ), schisto- somes (14 –15 ) and filarial parasites (16 –18 ). Undoubtedly, DNA probes will continue to make an important contribution to research progress in this area.