Abstract

Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis in Crohn’s Disease Is Serologically Positive Saleh Naser * and Ira Shafran Department of Molecular Biology and Microbiology and Center for Discovery of Drugs and Diagnostics University of Central Florida Orlando, Florida 32816 Crohn’s disease, similar to Johne’s disease (a Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis -caused inflammatory bowel disease in ruminants and primates), is an inflammatory bowel disease with suspected mycobacterial etiology ( 1 ). The disease emerged perceptibly in Western Europe and North America in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The incidence then increased progressively on both continents to a level which in some areas, such as northeast Scotland (11.6/100,000 per year), now approaches that of an epidemic ( 4 ). Granulomas and lymph node alteration in Crohn’s disease patients resemble those of tuberculosis, leprosy, sarcoidosis, and bovine paratuberculosis ( 3 ). The latter has been suggested as a reservoir for epidemiologic transmission of the microorganism through contaminated dairy and meat products and possibly even in water ( 5 ). In this study, we analyzed the humoral immune responses of Crohn’s disease patients compared with those of age-matched controls against two recombinant clones of M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis . The recombinant clones, designated