Figure 2

Amplification of spa -locus with novel primers spaT3-F/1517R from the samples with rearrangements in the spa -gene. A control sample does not have any rearrangements in the spa-gene and shows five PCR bands according to five annealing sites of the spaT3-F primer, including a faint band in the region of 500 bp. DelH shows one thick band most likely consisted of two merged bands from the two spaT3-F annealing sites that had been brought close together by the deletion. InsC2 has a bright band (600 bp) most likely consisted of two PCR products due to insertion of additional spaT3-F annealing site. The rest of the samples display the number of bands according to the types of rearrangements (Figure 3). Amplification of these samples with the standard spa-typing primers 1095 F/1517R will give no bands for the samples with delE and delG, which affect the position of 1095 F standard primer. For the rest of the sample PCR will generate a single band (double band for the insC2) located at a variable position on the ladder depending on the number of repeats within Xr region of each sample.