Multilocus genotyping reveals a polyphyletic pattern among naturally antimony-resistant Leishmania braziliensis isolates from Peru

In order to understand the epidemiological dynamics of antimonial (Sb ^V) resistance in zoonotic tegumentary leishmaniasis and its link with treatment outcome, we analyzed the population structure of 24 Peruvian Leishmania braziliensis clinical isolates with known in vitro antimony susceptibility and clinical phenotype by multilocus microsatellite typing (14 microsatellite loci). The genetic variability in the Peruvian isolates was high and the multilocus genotypes were strongly differentiated from each other. No correlation was found between the genotypes and in vitro drug susceptibility or clinical treatment outcome. The finding of a polyphyletic pattern among the Sb ^V-resistant L. braziliensis might be explained by (i) independent events of drug resistance emergence, (ii) sexual recombination and/or (iii) other phenomena mimicking recombination signals. Interestingly, the polyphyletic pattern observed here is very similar to the one we observed in the anthroponotic Leishmania donovani (Laurent et al., 2007), hereby questioning the role of transmission and/or chemotherapeutic drug pressure in the observed population structure.