Further studies of genetic variation in Schistosoma mansoni

Genetic studies on the human blood fluke Schistosoma mansoni were undertaken using starch gel electrophoresis to detect new gene loci and allelic variation. The number of enzyme staining systems useful with S. mansoni was increased from 14 to 34. It was found that unmated female worms stained as well as male worms. Three new polymorphic loci, fructose biphosphatase (FBP), gly-leu dipeptide peptidase (PEP-4), and glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (G3PDH) were detected. This brings the known number of polymorphic loci to 10 for this species. One locus (FBP) was found to be polymorphic in the PR-1 strain of S. mansoni. This strain was previously reported to be invariant.