Blastocystis Sequence Type Home Page - use it!

For all of you interested in subtyping of Blastocystis:

We recommend using barcoding (look up the paper by Scicluna et al., 2012 for primer sequences and gene target). Sequences can easily be assigned to subtype and even allele by using the blast alogorithm at

The Blastocystis Sequence Type Home Page

Batch submission of sequences even possible... should enable some speedy results!

Another Risk Factor Study

Absence of a piped water supply and low levels of mothers' education were the significant predictors of Blastocystis infection in a recent study of school children in Lipis and Raub districts of Pahang state, Malaysia (Abdulsalam et al., 2012)


Drinking water is a significant predictor of Blastocystis infection among rural Malaysian primary schoolchildren.

The study shows the clear benefit of using culture as opposed to e.g. concentration of fresh stools, and reports an overall prevalence of 25.7%. Looking forward to subtype data...

Novel Blastocystis real-time PCR

Our new real-time PCR for Blastocystis has been published in JCM.

Check it out at

Development and evaluation of a genus-specific, probe-based, internal process controlled real-time PCR assay for sensitive and specific detection of Blastocystis.

or

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22422846

and use it!