Molecular typing of some mycoplasma isolated from sheep in egypt

Sheep are one of the important farm animals in Egypt and wereestimated by 3.5 million head. Therefore, the aim of the present studywas assess the value of using the recent molecular tools in theepidemiological tracking of sheep mycoplasmal infection at differentlocalities.In this study, a total of 410 samples were collected fromapparently healthy and diseased sheep in Sharkia, Alexandria andBeheira govemorates in the form of nasal, conjunctival, ear, vaginalswabs as well as milk samples.One hundred and thirty-eight isolates were obtained by primaryisolation with percent (33.65%), these isolates divided to 64 fromSharkia with percentage of 46.71%, 49 from Alexandria withpercentage of 40.83% and 25 from Beheira with percentage of16.33%.Applying digitonin sensitivity test to the 138 isolates todifferentiate between Mycoplasma and Acholeplasma genera revealedSixty-eight of the obtained isolates were digitonin sensitive, belongingto genus Mycoplasma and 70 isolates were Acholeplasma.Mycoplasma isolates were subjected to biochemical tests asglucose fermentation, arginine deamiantion and film and spotformation. The results revealed the presence of three distinctbiochemical groups which summarized as following: